I'm getting ready to sell my laptop and want to ensure my personal information is safe. I reinstalled Windows to its factory settings, and while I did delete some files, I might have missed a few. Could someone who's tech-savvy recover those leftover files?
5 Answers
A good approach is to get two USB drives: one for Active Killdisk and another for the Windows installer. Boot from Killdisk first to securely erase your drive, then reinstall Windows from the other USB.
Yes, it's likely that some files could still be recovered. To be extra safe, consider using secure erasing software to completely wipe the drive.
A single full wipe using something like Linux's 'dd if=/dev/urandom' can make recovery nearly impossible for most casual attempts, including professional data recovery services. Just keep in mind, serious agencies with the right resources might still find ways to access some deleted data.
Most deletions only remove the pointers to the data, leaving the actual files intact on the disk. So technically, someone could recover them if they're skilled enough.
If you want to ensure everything is gone, encrypt your disk with BitLocker first, then boot from a recovery USB and format it. Use Diskpart to clean it and then reinstall Windows.
Do I have to reinstall Windows after doing the wipe?