How can I erase a video file totally from my system
By Edzornam
@Edzornam (138)
Ghana
11 responses
@brylle454 (606)
• Philippines
31 May 10
Try using some programs wherein they offer shredding, or just delete the file then empty the recycle bin. You probably need to erase your previous system restore points, dunno if thats possible though.
1 person likes this
@owlwings (43915)
• Cambridge, England
31 May 10
Programs which will delete a file by overwriting it are the most secure way, especially if they overwrite with zeroes or random data more than once.
Messing with restore points has no effect because when you create a restore point it merely records the state of the Registry files and (possibly) the File Allocation Tables and a few other things. Restoring to an earlier date does NOT delete any data on the disk!
@djhenerz96 (45)
• Australia
31 May 10
It is possible and it's not too hard to access those restore points but messing with them can cause trouble to your computer. I've had a friend who did that and accidentally deleted a system file and his computer wouldn't boot properly.
@mrfdg1972 (3237)
• Philippines
31 May 10
Move the copy to a flash drive or any usb device then throw away the usb/flash drive. After which create a new restore point. That should do the trick.
@owlwings (43915)
• Cambridge, England
31 May 10
Not secure enough. Creating a restore point doesn't erase ANY data on the disk. What you suggest is just a waste of a good flash drive!
@owlwings (43915)
• Cambridge, England
31 May 10
Once the disk space has been overwritten more than about two times (Government Security Standard), the data is no longer recoverable. If it is overwritten once, there is very sophisticated software which can read the residual magnetism and can deduce what was previously stored there. It is extremely expensive and needs many hours of labour and would only be considered worthwhile if the data to be recovered were of very significant value (such as top secret government information or information likely to threaten a country's security).
@mrfdg1972 (3237)
• Philippines
31 May 10
If we are talking of totaly 100% no recovery, I suggest he throw away the HD, Even shredded files can be recovered with Utility Restore License Version.
@stormragetz (567)
• Singapore
31 May 10
Just to side-track abit, I think the Mac's Thrash bin has a function that can totally erase data from the hardrive, unlike Window's Recyle bin.
@Boyetski (986)
• Philippines
31 May 10
You have to format your system to do that. Or make sure that after you delete the said file you back u your system. So when somebody try recovering your system, your pC will recover only at the date when you deleted the file. I think thats better.
@owlwings (43915)
• Cambridge, England
31 May 10
NO! You DON'T have to format the whole disk! In any case, formatting is NOT secure: there are programs that can recover every single bit of data on a freshly formatted drive! (They are expensive and used only by professionals but they ARE available).
Backing up the drive after deleting the file, THEN formatting and restoring from backup is likely to be more effective, however (though it is far too time-consuming to consider).
1 person likes this
@juggerogre (1653)
• Philippines
31 May 10
The best way would be to destroy the hard disk. Burn it and destroy it to pieces. Recovery tools are becoming very good nowadays. They can easily recover your files no matter how many time you reformat.
@archon309 (404)
• Philippines
31 May 10
I think you should try the File Shredder from download.cnet.com it's a free utility. BTW, reformatting your drive is not a guarantee. I was able to recover files from a reformatted drive using a good file recovery utility.
Keep Lotting
@owlwings (43915)
• Cambridge, England
31 May 10
Deleting a file does not normally (at first) delete the data on disk. It simply marks the index record for that file as 'deleted' and so frees up the space that is used by the file data, effectively saying: "This is free space. The next time you need to create a file, you can use this space."
At first, of course, the file system does nothing with the space and the file could be recovered completely. As time goes on, however, and you create or store new files, that space may be partially or completely overwritten, very likely making the data unreadable (many files, particularly compressed files such as JPG or MP4 files, become effectively unreadable once part of them is overwritten).
There are many applications available (some of them free) which will 'shred' files - that is, completely erase them - and they do this by physically writing nonsense characters to the same disk space that the file occupied. If you know how to use a Hex Editor, it is possible (but time consuming) to do this manually. You need to open the file in your Hex Editor and change the data to zeroes or random characters and then save it back to its original location. To be really safe, you should do this more than once because some (very expensive and professional) recovery tools can still read data, even if it has been overwritten. This is what is done to comply with some Government secrecy standards and it's unlikely that your file is in that league!
Just a couple of free tools that you might like to look at are listed here:
http://www.thefreecountry.com/security/securedelete.shtml
http://eraser.heidi.ie/
I have no personal recommendations (because I haven't needed to use them) but their basic operation is always as I explained above: the differences will be in the interfaces and how user-friendly they are.
@lovedude (4447)
• India
31 May 10
deleting file will erase entry from file system.. an easy and tricky way is copy 1-2 GB data to that particular partition or drive and delete them so it will overwrite your video file entry and also defragement the disk after that. so none recovery software can easily track it..
@mysticmaggie (2498)
• United States
1 Jun 10
My son is a data recovery specialist and he says you need a program to delete AND purge files to DOD standards. OnTrack used to sell a program for this purpose and it may still be available online even though OnTrack sold to another company.
