The best way to delete secret files from their roots on Windows (irreversibly)
| The best way to delete secret files from their roots on Windows (irreversibly) |
When you ask Windows to delete a certain file, you will think that this file is gone forever, and this is understandable and natural since this file is no longer visible to you anywhere on the hard drive. However, with some professional file recovery software, it is still possible to recover deleted files with ease. Therefore, if you are planning to sell the hard drive to someone else or are afraid that a stranger might access your confidential files while you are away from the computer, you should know what is the best way to delete confidential files from their roots on Windows
The best way to delete confidential files from their roots
Haven’t you ever wondered how file recovery software and tools can recover deleted files? We’ll tell you the whole idea. When you ask Windows to delete a file, it doesn’t delete the file permanently, even if you delete it using the “Shift + Del” shortcut. Instead, Windows marks the space occupied by that file as free space in preparation for overwriting with any new data. But if you don’t overwrite it by storing new data on the hard drive, there will still be parts of your old files’ data already present in the deep storage structures, which file recovery software and tools can still access, process, and recover again.
So, when you delete a particular file from your storage drive, it actually remains on your hard drive, or at least large parts of it. With the right software and a little bit of experience, you have a good chance of recovering your deleted files back. This means that your confidential data is at great risk if you have formatted your hard drive and are planning to sell it to a stranger and think that your important files are gone forever. So, in this guide, we will share with you a simple trick or the best way to delete confidential files from their roots on Windows.
■ Method 1: File Encryption
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| Delete files permanently without recovering them |
We have previously explained how to encrypt your confidential files on Windows without third-party software using the default Bitlocker application in Windows. Actually, encrypting files does not mean that deleted files are impossible to recover, but without your secret encryption key, no one will be able to access your encrypted files. Therefore, encrypting files with Bitlocker or Veracrypt is just like deleting files permanently, but be careful that no one else can access your encryption key. Therefore, it can be considered one of the best ways to delete confidential files from the root on Windows.
■ The second method: using the Cipher command
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| The best tool to delete files permanently and irrevocably |
Windows includes a Cipher command which is basically a tool that is responsible for writing the free space on your hard drive with random data that has nothing to do with your confidential data. Using this command in Command Prompt will start writing all the free space on your hard drive with random data, which makes it difficult to recover files that were deleted before using the command.
However, using Cipher tool is very time consuming if you have a very large free space on your hard drive. Note that writing to the hard drive using Cipher command does not mean that your free storage space will be gone forever, on the contrary, your free storage space will remain the same, but it will be difficult to recover deleted files again.
Another downside to Cipher is that it is very taxing on your hard drive, and may increase the wear and tear on your solid-state storage solutions. However, if you think this is the best solution for you, you can open a command prompt by searching for “ CMD ” in the start menu and then type the following command: Cipher /w:c : Note that “C” stands for partition:C, so if you want to replace the free space on partition F, the command should be: Cipher /W:F : and the same for partitions D, G, H, etc. The process of replacing the unallocated space will begin, which will take a long time – as we just mentioned – depending on how much free space you have on your hard drive.
If you want to reduce the time it takes for this tool to run, there is another solution, which is to write the path of the folder or file you deleted in order to overwrite it to prevent its contents from being recovered again. To do this, you should type the command line as follows: Cipher /W:C:\Secret but replace the word "Secret" with the name of the folder that contains your confidential data.
Suppose you have a secret folder named “My Data” which contains your confidential data, which you have just deleted. To prevent the data of this folder from being recovered again using Cipher, you should type the following command: Cipher /w:c:\my data This method is much faster because it replaces the free space within a specific storage path and not the entire free storage space. This is the best way to delete confidential files from their roots on Windows faster.
A simple note: The last method can only be used if your hard disk is partitioned with NTFS for files only.
■ The third method: Using File Shredder
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| Remove files from their roots on Windows |
The third method that we consider the best way to delete confidential files from their roots is to use one of the external programs that works to shred the remaining parts of the deleted files so that it is difficult or impossible to recover them again. However, it is not completely different from the Cipher command in the way it works because it writes on the empty spaces with random data and then deletes them again.
Some of the programs we recommend trying are File Shredder , which is a free program that recognizes solid storage solutions and uses the right techniques with them so as not to cause their condition to deteriorate, and at the same time, ensures that deleted files cannot be recovered again in any way.
■ Fourth method: Use the manufacturer's software
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| Permanently erase confidential files so they cannot be recovered. |
Windows has a TRIM command that defragments hard drives, but it also makes it harder to recover deleted files. Some computers have tools within the BIOS that provide secure wipe functions to delete files from their root.
But even better, if you have an SSD, you can download the manufacturer's software like Samsung Magician if you have a Samsung SSD and look for the "Secure Erase" option and use a USB flash drive to burn the tool to it and use it.
■ What to do next
After you have finished using one of the best ways to delete secret files from their roots that we just explained, you should start using one of the file recovery programs as a kind of experiment to see for yourself whether these tools can recover your deleted files again or not. You can try a program like Recuva since the free version allows you to preview the recoverable files. Therefore, you do not need to purchase any of these tools because you do not need to recover deleted files, but it is just a test to see whether your deleted files can be recovered or not.
In conclusion , everything we have discussed in this article is one of the best ways to quickly delete files from their roots on your computer, phone, or any other storage device. You should write on the free space on your hard drive or any storage device to make it difficult for data recovery tools to find parts of previously deleted data.