If you have been storing your private documents, personal files like videos and pictures on your hard disk then you should erase all of these securely before recycling, selling or giving that hard disk away. If you just delete the files from the hard disk, then anybody using a data recovery tool like Recuva can recover the files within a few minutes. A free software called Macrorit Data Wiper can help you securely and permanently erase all the data from from a disk drive attached to your PC.
Macrorit Data Wiper uses a number of different algorithms to erase your data irrecoverably. The program itself is a portable application and can be used on any Windows PC without having to install it. After you launch the Data Wiper, it shows you a list of all the disks and partitions available in your PC. If you attach a disk (like USB pen-drive) after launching Data Wiper then you can click on the Reload disks button to refresh and reload all the available disks/partitions all over again.
First of all you have to select what kind of disk space you want to erase – free disk space or the entire disk space (including the free disk space). If you are thinking of selling or giving away your disk, then choose the “entire disk” option. In case you just want to erase all the files that you already have deleted previously, you can choose “free disk space” option.
Next, you can choose one of the erasing methods which basically control how the data is going to be overwritten. You can choose to overwrite the data using zeros, ones, zeros & ones etc. You can also choose to use United States Department of Defense (US DoD) overwriting algorithms for very high secure levels of data destruction.
Finally, you have to select the target the disk or partition and click on the Wipe Now button. Depending on your hardware, the disk size and overall performance of your PC, this may take a long time to finish. After the process is complete, you won’t be able to recover any data from the target partition.
Verdict: Macrorit Data Wiper is very convenient way of permanently destructing the data on your disks. But the software can securely erase the data only from disks and partitions – you cannot use it to securely erase individual files.
You can download Macrorit Data Wiper from http://macrorit.com/free-data-wiper.html.