Proper Erasing/Formating Win98 Box

Ola:

I have been receving various advice about a box we came across that we need to prep for resource recovery. We were told to erase all of the contents and re-format the drive. I am questioning if we actually need to reformat the drive, or just use Eraser to do the job. I have already started using Eraser, but was checking Google, some other IT colleagues and thought to ask here to make sure we were on the right path. I look forward and welcome your input if we are on the right path, or need to add/change anything in wiping this box.

edit

Almost forgot, the box is an IBM Aptiva running Windows 98.

/edit

In advance:

Gracias.

Can't you just format c: ??

Do this a couple of times maybe?, or if your concerned about data security cos your selling the box, get a bootable linux disc and use dd to fill the harddisk up with 1 and 0's a couple of times, this the US military do this process 8 times if my memory is right, and then format it?

i2c

Hi,

I would use eraser to wipe business/ personal files and the freespace. I can't remember if eraser wipes freespace or not? If not you will need another tool.

Then boot into safe mode and defragment the drive.

Then reformat.

That will leave the operating system in a theoretically recoverable state, but would comply with any group licencing you may have had.

Cheers

Quote:

---

I can't remember if eraser wipes freespace or not? If not you will need another tool.

---

Download GWSCAN.EXE and throw it on a W98 boot disk. Boot the floppy, run GWSCAN and write zeros to the entire disk. Presto. All disk space is wiped. This tool is intended for use on disks that do not contain classified information, i.e., this tool will not make the disk safe from recovery based on NSA guidelines.

I would suggest a tool called BCWipe, which does 7-write wiping and is what the gov't uses for clear drives. There is a trial version available.

Personally I use a program called DBAN. Available for free from http://dban.sourceforge.net/
It allows all kinds of different wipes including DOD and GUTMANN wipes.

LLF or data erasing tool is better in terms of wiping off data and time taken?

Ola:

Thanks for the responses back, lots of good information.

Quote:

---

Download GWSCAN.EXE and throw it on a W98 boot disk. Boot the floppy, run GWSCAN and write zeros to the entire disk. Presto. All disk space is wiped. This tool is intended for use on disks that do not contain classified information, i.e., this tool will not make the disk safe from recovery based on NSA guidelines.

---

I have been searching Google for GWSCAN (Gateway(?) Scan) and found only one site, an edu site, that had it - but you need a id/pw for it. Also looked here and download. com. Any other places I may find it?

edit

This is where I found the download that required a id/pw - good instructions as well:

http://www.lehigh.edu/security/gwscan/gwscan.htm

/edit

In advance:

Gracias.

Quote:

---

Originally posted here by ashimon
Personally I use a program called DBAN. Available for free from http://dban.sourceforge.net/
It allows all kinds of different wipes including DOD and GUTMANN wipes.

---

I also use dban, and would suggest it to anybody that needed a secure way of deleting a Hard Drive for a clean install of any OS. Great for when you are selling a PC and do not want any possible personal information to be exposed. I use a System Rescue CD that contains dban and many other tools for working on a Hard drive.

Ultimate BootCD is another one which contain serveral data wiping tools :p

thehorse13

if you write 0 to the whole HD ... what can NSA do to recover data?

Quote:

---

Originally posted here by unhappy
thehorse13

if you write 0 to the whole HD ... what can NSA do to recover data?

---

You're thinking very digitally, but data in fact is still stored analogly on the drive. As a head writes data to a drive it writes it in a threshold space. This space is a very small amount of the platter and can vary an even smaller distance left or right. Each time you write data, its in a slightly different spot, even in the same bit on the drive. Its in these small offsets that you can still retrieve data later on. This is why overwriting a number of times writes to more and more of these little offsets and renders the data useless.