Posts Tagged ‘sensitive files’
August 9th, 2009 | 
Author: One of the more pressing computer problems today is spyware- a program that you unknowingly download that is capable of spying on your activities and bombards you with several pop-ups or redirects you to websites in accordance to your spied profile. When you do not want to compromise your security and privacy with this type of malware, it is advisable to download spyware sweeper that can get rid of your computer problems today.
A good spyware sweeper is comprehensive in eliminating spyware programs in your computer.
It is able to detect spyware that wreaks havoc in your computer without you having to run the program for several times. Most of the spyware are embedded in hard to find location but an effective sweeper will be able to sweep these spyware regardless where they are located. A good sweeper will also be able to protect your computer in real time and prevent the malicious program to spy on your activities. Preventive in nature, a good sweeper will be able to clock the malicious programs before they can even enter your computer and do some damage.
You see spyware programs enter your computer easily without you being aware of it. It hides itself into one of those freeware programs that you download from the net. When a spyware program has entered your computer, it is quite difficult to remove it and before you know it has already accomplished its purpose. This is the reason a good sweeper is integral to get rid of the spyware and prevent them to do harm to your computer and sensitive files. It is not enough to have an anti-virus program running in your hardware as they will not cover for this type of malicious program. Most of the anti-virus programs have limited capabilities in eliminating spyware which by the way has also the ability to replicate itself even when detected and swept.
You therefore need a spyware sweeper that can do the following and more: (1) find the hidden spyware programs in your computer; (2) get rid of the spyware that recreate themselves after being detected and removed; (3) prevent you from unconsciously downloading a spyware from the internet.
Here are some useful tips on how to choose your good sweeper. First, you can visit several review sites that will show you how effective or ineffective the anti-spyware programs are and how actual users are rating the software programs. It will also help to choose a spyware sweeper that uses only minimal computer resources while it effectively sweeps all the spyware programs that it has detected on your hardware. You can also benefit more from a program that is able to automatically update itself.
You can start your search for a good sweeper right now. The internet is a good place to locate the necessary program as it also offers you all the resources that will help you to ensure that your computer is free from malicious programs like spyware. It is always important to protect your computer from unwanted programs with a registry cleaner in the likes of the spyware sweeper. Never compromise your security and privacy. Keep your computer clean.
Curious if Spyware Sweeper will work to fix your computers problems? We have the #1 ranked computer problem fixer for registry, spyware, and AdWare available for a free download at http://www.FixMyComputerQuick.com
Article Source: Spyware Sweeper – Get Rid of Your Computer Problems Today!
A lot of people have some information that they would rather not share with anyone – passwords, sensitive information, classified documents from work, the list can be expanded forever. Perhaps you have saved some of this data on your computer where it is conveniently at your reach, but when the time comes to erase the files from your HDD, things get a bit more complicated and saving your privacy is not as easy as it may have seemed at first.
Standard file and folder erasing can be insecure
Your first thought may be that when you delete a file, the data is gone. Unfortunately, when you erase file or folder, the OS does not really remove the files from the HDD; it only removes the reference of the file from the file system table. The data keeps on the hard driver as long as another file is created over it, and even after that, it might be possible to recover information by exploring the magnetic fields on the disk platter surface. Before the file is overwritten, anyone can easily get it with a disk maintenance or an undelete utility.
For instance, imagine that you have been surfing on the Internet for a while and afterwards wish to clear any traces revealing what pages you visited. You go to Internet Explorer settings and select to delete the cache and the history file, the information is now gone you think to yourself – well think again. The browser cache files can with no trouble be restored with an undelete software and your privacy is once again compromised.
To be sure that a file is gone, its contents must be appropriately overwritten before deleting. As simple as it looks, there are several difficulties in secure data erasing, mostly caused by the construction of a disk and the use of files encoding. These troubles have been taken into account when special eraser utility is designed and because this intuitive design you able to safely and easily delete sensitive files from your hard disk.
You have most likely already insecurely erased countless amount of files from the hard driver and from time to time applications create (and insecurely remove) temporary files on your HDD containing some possibly personal data that you would rather not show to anyone. This data remains on the disk until it gets overwritten and can be restored with simple HDD utility.
This is where the erasing of unused hard driver space can be useful. The erasing of free hard driver space means that all unused space on your HDD will be overwritten so that data earlier saved on it cannot be retrieved. Good eraser software provides you a convenient way to erase the unused hard driver space regularly in order to remove the remains of temporary files and other sensitive data you possibly have had on your hard driver.
You must be asking what this application does to my computer when erasing data. You have come to the right place, the procedures gone through when erasing files are explained in this article.
After determining the type of the file (data encrypted or compressed at the file system level are supported on Windows NT and 2000, but Administrator rights are required for low-level HDD access), Eraser needs to calculate the size of the file. When calculating the size, the cluster tip area is included so the data stored on it will be erased too.
Once the size is calculated, the data will be overwritten with the special technique (see full descriptions of the techniques bellow). Eraser tool takes care of flushing write buffers to make sure that the data really gets written to the disk and is not only saved in a buffer somewhere. If the overwriting was successful, the final step is to correctly erase the file.
Before deleting the reference of the data from the file system (normal remove), the file will be truncated to zero length to clear traces of the allocated clusters, the filename will be overwritten and finally file dates (creation, access and modified) will be scrambled to complete the file deleting.
Gutmann’s Method
Based on Gutmann’s article “Secure Deletion of Data from Magnetic and Solid-State Memory”, this method provides the best security. File will be written 35 times with carefully selected patterns, which makes it unrecoverable.
This method is used as the default for erasing data, but has been proven to be very slow when clearing free space on a hard driver (could be several gigabytes).
A Faster Method – US DoD 5220-22.M
Two methods based on United States Department of Defense recommendation 5220-22.M from January 1995. The data will be overwritten seven times making this method much faster than the first one, but also less secure when it comes to hardware recovery.
Random Data
All passes will be pseudorandom data, which is very incompressible. Therefore, this is the only method that should be used when deleting free space or information on a compressed drive. The number of passes is user selectable from one to 65535.
Being the fastest method, this one is used as recommended for deleting unused disk space.
Author is founder of Free Security Tools. Visit our site to find open source file deleting program.
Article Source: Secure Deletion Private Data From Your Computer: Tips And Tricks For Windows
Most of us these days are aware of the fact that our electronic data is not secure. Anyone on the web with a little know-how could access our computer over the Internet and get into our files. To keep our electronic data safe it is important to remember to password protect your MS Office documents. Password protecting documents takes very little effort and will prevent important or sensitive files from falling into the wrong hands.
By placing a password on your important files you are ensuring that your documents are safe from those who would seek to exploit it, such as identity thieves. If you own a company you will want to do the same for your financial information as well as and documents that contain info about your clients. While you may not think it is important now, if the data should ever get stolen you will be thankful for it.
There is one small downside to password protecting your documents ” what happens if you lose the password to a file? While you probably like to write down the passwords to your documents somewhere, this is not very safe as someone could find them and all your documents would be at risk. At the same time if you dont write them down you run the risk of losing all your important data if you forget the passwords associated with the files.
This is where you need a password recovery tool. There are several different types of programs available that can help you get into your files. While some of them are free, you will have much better success with a licensed version of password recovery software as they offer more options and have more streamlined recovery algorithms.
There are many kinds of password recover programs, but most of them work in the same way. They will try to access the file by guessing the password. If your password is relatively strong it may take some time for the software to find the right combination of characters.
To start the program will work through the dictionary, combining each word with numbers or symbols if you request. If your password is an actually word, then you should have some luck here. Otherwise the software recovery tool will carry on to the next step, which is to try combinations of letters, numbers and symbols until it finds the right combination. The more complicated your password is, the longer the program will take to find the answer.
Finally the password recovery software can simply disable the password protection on the file. This is where you want to be careful, as once the password protection is removed then your files are again in danger. Ensure you quickly protect them again once you have got in, and remember the password this time!
While this type of software is a great tool to use when you forget your password, it should not replace whatever method you use to keep track of your passwords. Create a bomb-proof file with a long and complicated password to store the keys to your other files, and commit the password to this file to memory ” do not write it down, or if you do keep it in a safe place where no one will find it. Then you can rest knowing that all your files are safe and sound.
Password protecting your file can be a pain yes but think of the alternative. The next time you are password protecting your MS Office file which include: word, excel, outlook, powerpoint, etc you think if creating a separate secure password protected file to store all your passwords in. This way you can access them all with the simple use of one password.
Albert McZeally has many articles on office security. If you become interested in learning more about Office Password Recovery, read more of his complete guides or articles on the subject matter. Complete information on word recovery softwbecome located at Word Password Recovery.
Article Source: MS Office Passwords and Password Recovery Programs
To give data thieves a toss it is necessary to securely remove all the data. For complete destruction of sensitive information, one needs to be really careful. At times while using the data erasure programs, we are not careful and remove the requisite information as well. In order to overcome this tensed situation, either you can take up the back up of the important documents / you can hire a professional secure data destruction services company.
There are many companies around the world offering “data destruction services”. They have the expertise in clearing the financial data of the company. This includes audit reports, balance sheets, payments and receipts, contract notes and much more. In the similar capacity they have the experience in deleting personal information that includes security password, contact information, bank accounts, etc, too. For summiting to the demands of different industries, they provide customized solution.
For secure data destruction, they use a secure mode of compilation, and destruction of sensitive files, documents, spreadsheets. Easily they can cross check whether the data is been deleted or not and then recycle it. They do not make compromise on their part and see that no information as desired by the client is deleted. This at times includes legal, sensitive and financial information, which can affect the business in long term or result in breach of trust.
When you select professional and secure data destruction company, check their credentials. There are many companies’ competent services but only few are well versed with the nuances of data destruction. If you give your data to an unreliable company, then there are higher chances of information not been securely removed or may result in problem for which you have to pay in future.
QSGI – A complete Information Technology Solution provider to help corporations and governmental agencies better manage software assets, hardware assets, reduce maintenance expenses, build best practices for data security and assure regulatory compliance.
Article Source: Professional and secure data destruction services