CODEWITHSUNDEEP
filesecurityerase
demitreos
demitreos

Reputation: 21

Secure delete files on Windows 10

I want to securely delete my context of my SSD hard disk. I had a look on sdelete but i realized that file names are not deleted or overwrited.

Is there any free tool that i can achieve the above?

Thank you

Upvotes: 0

Views: 3151

Answers (2)

Alexandre Brito
Alexandre Brito

Reputation: 31

I'm not sure if you want to delete permanently or secure delete from the drive and so that the file cannot be recovered.

So, these are the two ways:

  • Delete permanently: in Windows Explorer, you can select the file and type "shift + del" on the keyboard. This way the file will not be moved to your recycle bin.
  • Secure delete: When you delete a file from a HDD, the sector of the disk is marked as unused and not really erased. So, you need a software to replace these sector with "nothing" and avoid others user from recovering your deleted files using other software. One very good piece of software is ERASER, it supports a very good method that totally erases the file from the disk, called "Gutmann standard": it overwrites the deleted files 35 times. This protects against software that attempts to recover data by reading the same sectors on the disk several times.

But, in your case, the disk is a SSD, the only way to secure erase the file, really destroying all the data, is reformatting it.

An alternative to this bad solution, which prevents recovery, is to enable full-drive encryption. This option is already available on Windows 10.

Of course, the file that you want to delete, can't be in use.

Upvotes: 1

Robert
Robert

Reputation: 42799

Erasing an SSD is not that easy because SSDs are more like mini-computers with an own OS only showing you only some of the data saved in it's flash chips. Als wear-leveling algorithms and overprovisioning makes secure deleting on user level next to impossible.

As far as I know there is only one solution to securely delete data on an SSD (without destroying the SSD):

Perform the Secure Erase Command using a SSD software - usually provided by the SD manufacturer itself.

It deletes and recreates the internal encryption key which makes all the data unreadable that is stored on the SSD.

Note that the secure erase command is not supported by every SSD.

Upvotes: 1

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