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Scramble / Edit --- AVI video files

M

macman221285

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Oct 6, 2009
6
0
Hi,

I have a mac book and run Mac os x 10.5.7. I have some personal files containing client's financial data that I PERMANENTLY want to delete. That is - delete so that they can never ever be recovered. I am aware of 'Secure Empty Trash' but does this ensure that they can never be retrieved? Please can you give me your advice on how this?
 
AFAIK the secure empty trash option will do 7 overwrite passes on the sectors the file is contained in. Unless you're a tinfoil hat conspiracy theorist that should be good enough.
 
Scramble / Edit --- AVI video files

OK, so I admit, my girlfriend and I made a couple of raunchy videos and while on holiday, and when I uploaded my holiday photos from my digital camera to my macbook, the videos were uploaded to.

It wouldn't be a problem, but it was my work computer! So now there are raunchy AVI videos of me and my girlfriend on my work computer. I don't just want to delete them in case they can be retrieved - I want to make sure that nobody can ever see them again. Is there a way I can scramble/corrupt the AVI files before I delete them?

Please help!
 
Raid - so you mean 'Secure empty trash' should be enough? Does it apply to all file types? Word/Excel/mpegs/jpegs etc?
 
macman221285 said:
OK, so I admit, my girlfriend and I made a couple of raunchy videos and while on holiday, and when I uploaded my holiday photos from my digital camera to my macbook, the videos were uploaded to.

It wouldn't be a problem, but it was my work computer! So now there are raunchy AVI videos of me and my girlfriend on my work computer. I don't just want to delete them in case they can be retrieved - I want to make sure that nobody can ever see them again. Is there a way I can scramble/corrupt the AVI files before I delete them?

Please help!
Click to expand...

Dude, send the files to me, I'll delete them for you, I promise;)

Your on facebook right?
 
macman221285 said:
I am aware of 'Secure Empty Trash' but does this ensure that they can never be retrieved? Please can you give me your advice on how this?
Click to expand...

"never" is a long time. How to achieve the closest thing possible to this varies on your level of paranoia.

If you've normal paranoia, secure erase is enough. It does an overwrite, though I don't remember how many times (7?). It doesn't care what the file format it. It simply overwrites the space on the disk with junk (zeros, IIRC).

If you're super paranoid, you can then erase free disk space from Disk Utility. That will write zeros over all your free disk space. Make sure you have enough free disk space to try that.

If you're uber paranoid, clone your disk using SuperDuper! and then do a massive 35x overwrite on your disk, and clone everything back. Tin-foil hat not included.

Secure erase is fine.
 
macman221285 said:
OK, so I admit, my girlfriend and I made a couple of raunchy videos and while on holiday, and when I uploaded my holiday photos from my digital camera to my macbook, the videos were uploaded to.

It wouldn't be a problem, but it was my work computer! So now there are raunchy AVI videos of me and my girlfriend on my work computer. I don't just want to delete them in case they can be retrieved - I want to make sure that nobody can ever see them again. Is there a way I can scramble/corrupt the AVI files before I delete them?

Please help!
Click to expand...


Dude, thats frekkin awesome! :D:D
 
macman221285 said:
OK, so I admit, my girlfriend and I made a couple of raunchy videos and while on holiday, and when I uploaded my holiday photos from my digital camera to my macbook, the videos were uploaded to.

It wouldn't be a problem, but it was my work computer! So now there are raunchy AVI videos of me and my girlfriend on my work computer. I don't just want to delete them in case they can be retrieved - I want to make sure that nobody can ever see them again. Is there a way I can scramble/corrupt the AVI files before I delete them?

Please help!
Click to expand...

Love it! Show your boss.
 
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