Selling external hard drive on Craigslist - security question.

[xlome]

Hello

I have some external 2.5 and 3.5 form factor hard drives. I have reformatted every drive and everything is erased. I understand someone can go in and use software to retrieve the deleted files.
My question is how do I make the drives secure before selling them? Any suggestions would be appreciated.

Thanks.

 

[linuxhero27]

Apple computers have a cool feature where it can erase your hard drive numerous times to ensure data is gone forever. After so many deletions, there's barely a chance that the disks can retain any old information.

You really can't be too certain, unfortunately. I would say do several low-level formats just to be sure.

 

[runswindows95]

http://www.killdisk.com/

Could also download and run this.

 

[xlome]

Okay thanks.

 

[supflx]

Hello

I have some external 2.5 and 3.5 form factor hard drives. I have reformatted every drive and everything is erased. I understand someone can go in and use software to retrieve the deleted files.
My question is how do I make the drives secure before selling them? Any suggestions would be appreciated.

Thanks.

I looked up secure wipe on the net and ran across this web site where you can download a program called Darik's Boot And Nuke, here is the site web address:
http://www.dban.org/.
There is also some good information about wiping hard drives on this web site.
http://www.zdnet.com/blog/storage/how-to-really-erase-a-hard-drive/129