If the police check my shit, they might. I've got a lot of shit on it, I'm fucked. How do I erase everything except my software. I'm running Windows ME. Help me out.

take the hard drive out of the computer, fill it with black powder, ignite, then wrap it in a paper bag and throw it into a river..

that should do the trick!

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ok...if you say so
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for informational purposes only
http://spudszilla.cjb.net

Use Cyberscrub, it really works and iv checked my computer with forensic software after i used it and yo behold all that info and internet debris etc etc etc was gone. Well recommended m8.

I use historykill. It works good to erase (almost) all your surfing info. But what pissed me of is it doesn't erase c:\windows\tempor~1\content.ie5\index.dat or
c:\windows\tempor~1\history.ie5\index.dat.
I don't know what the software makers where thinking...
If you use IE and don't know about these files I suggest you check them out(use Edit or some other text editor).
it is designated a sytem file so you cant c:\>Del *.dat
The first line also gives you the directories that IE created there should be three random names, 8 digits long...
it keeps every website you visited for a LONG time...
I wrote a .BAT file which runs from my autoexec.bat every time I start my computer to get rid of these. I could post it if anyone is interested...but it just erases them from your directory, it doesn't overwrite it 20 times or anything. I guess I'm more worried about other users that the Feds.
Does Cyberscrub erase these?

Here's what you do. Buy a removable hd cart device like Jaz and put all your kiddy porn on there. Keep the cart on you at all times and stomp on it if the popo come a runnin.

Magnets work

Even with all the file and history removal programs out there, your never gonna get rid of everything. Your computer keeps logs of stuff you do that not many people know how to access. Just take out your HD and keep it in a safe place they would never look for the time being. Then just replace it with a different one without any shit on it. When the heat is gone just put your old one back in.

format C:
oh and when u reinstall win defrag your hard disk

wouldn't work y2, the forensics they have now can deal with repeated format/defrags. Blowing it up is one of the safest ways to deal with it.

there's a prog called clear disk that u boot up from floppy that overwrites all the binarry to 0's i'm no computer expert but i think that would do the trick.

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dub.

Use two hardrives.

Or do what I said...

quote:

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Originally posted by dub:
there's a prog called clear disk that u boot up from floppy that overwrites all the binary to 0's i'm no computer expert but i think that would do the trick.

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Your right in principle but in practice as the hard disk is used to position of the write head on the drive changes slightly this means that when data is over written there is a shadow left by the bytes that were previously on that position.
This effect can be counter acted by having many passes over the disk and writing random bits rather than 0's. Any good disk wiping prog will do this. The problem isn't to wipe stuff that no longer has FAT entries but to delete all the files so their disk space can be wiped. This is due to windows mania for keeping logs and redundant copies, more over these copies often don't represent redundancy within the system since missing any of them is critical. Bollocks to that.

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~Kameron
Carpe Aptenodytes! (Seize the Penguins!)

fair enough.
your fucked then, that'll teach you to look at kiddy porn

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dub.

wouldn't it have been a good idea to research this BEFORE you went doing "bad things"?

[This message has been edited by DefiKayt (edited 06-20-2001).]

back up your hard drive onto a cdr and then format your harddrive! Thats What i do

just stop all the kiddie porn dumshit!get the real shit thats LEGAL!

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Keep a large drum of HCl handy.

I may be showing my version here... but has any one looked at there user.dat file recently ? And ummm... no you don't wanna go deleting that.

If you worried abotu police... then yeah... you should probably just destroy the disk. Or reformat a couple of times. If you install a whole lot of copies of windows that'll filler up ! (not quite random but... lol) anyway, is you really want the disk to be clean... format it, then clean it, wiping over all sectors at least 12 times (US Military stadard is 7... which means they can probably recover from 7)... then to be safe in stall a whole lot of stuff on it. Ie fill it up with working programs.

Running Defrag... what a great idea ! (won't help much with the security but you sure will have a fragmeneted disk by the end of it !

Also... consider changing operating systems. Turn it into a linux box at the end... reformat to linux standard... then even if they do get it... they'll be interpreting the 10010100101010 wrong.

If it were me, i'd go for
Jadedfools idea and blow the bastard thing up and start again.

Just go to www.download.com get a program called BCWipe.exe or BCCrypt.exe
BCWipe utility provides 3 ways to shred files' contents from the disk when you delete your sensitive files:

a. Delete with wiping. Using 'Delete with wiping' command you can delete and wipe your files and folders from Windows Shell (Explorer program);

b. Wipe free disk space. If you have deleted sensitive files using standard operating system command, you may wipe free space on the disk where these files were stored - all previously deleted files' contents become erased;

c. Swap file wiping. BCWipe utility automatically wipes Windows Swap file contents when you run 'Wipe free disk space' command.
d. Files slacks wiping. File slack is the disk space from the end of a file till the end of the last cluster used by that file. You can turn on/off file slack wiping before 'Wipe disk free space' process.
OR wipe the mother with this program, eat it whole. Then inturn destorying the evidence *cough* kiddE p0rn*cough*

BCwipe is Cryptographicly sound, good random numbers but optimized for the intel chipset.

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~Kameron
Carpe Aptenodytes! (Seize the Penguins!)

ticktockbaer47,

I see that you have had some drastic advice that would do the trick and some advice that certainly wouldn't.
People who should know tell me:

Install and use Evidence Eliminator (www.evidence-eliminator.com) It is capable of rooting out and deleting caches of hidden information that are created by the Windows OS and browser(s) and will, like few other "shredders", scrub deleted information and magnetic remenance from underneath existing files/folders.

To keep any files you want secret and encypted and you are using Windows NT/2000/XT, then use SeNTry from http://www.softwinter.com/

That's it,
Cheers

we're confusing serious forensic work with people flushing their web caches here. Those programs won't do shit against a lab with the equipment to extract your data...