I have a Mac computer and I was wondering, when I empty my trash is it all erased off of the computer forever?

Question

Say I wanted to delete a picture, and I put it in the trash, and then emptied my trash. Would the picture be gone for good? If not, is there any way to make it gone for good after I've emptied my trash? Please help. Thank you!

Answer 1

It is not yet gone for good. You can take your Mac computer to an Apple store to retrieve it.

There is a way to wipe it out for good. Open Disk Utility from  Applications/Utilities. Click on your Hard Drive (Macintosh HD by default). Click on the Erase tab on top, and choose Erase Free Space.

It presents you with 3 options, with their respective descriptions. Just pick any.

Answer 2

Data can be recovered until it's written over by new data.

"There is a way to wipe it out for good. Open Disk Utility from Applications/Utilities. Click on your Hard Drive (Macintosh HD by default). Click on the Erase tab on top, and choose Erase Free Space."

You can also choose to secure delete when you empty the trash.