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Securely Delete Data with Eraser
An Irish security software company (Heidi.ie) sponsors the development of a freeware program that allows you to securely erase files from within Windows. The program, simply called Eraser can be downloaded from the Sourceforge Project page:http://sourceforge.net/projects/eraser/
When you have the Eraser project page open in your web browser, click the "Download" link located in the green section in the upper right hand corner of the screen:
Once you've clicked the link, you'll be taken to the project download page. Here there will be two more "Download" links. You want the top one which will correspond to the line item titled: "Eraser Latest Edition 5.86a"
Once you have clicked on the "Download" link on this page, you will be redirected to one more page before you can start the actual download. On the new page you will see links to two files. The top link is named "EraserSetup32.exe" and the bottom link is named "EraserSetup64.exe" Each link corresponds to whether you have a 32 bit or 64 bit edition of Windows installed. If you do not know whether you have 32 bit or 64 bit Windows installed, choose the top link to the file named "EraserSetup32.exe" as it should work on all versions of Windows.
After you have clicked the appropriate link, you should get a popup message similar to the one below asking you to save the file:
It's easiest to save the file to the desktop temporarily so that can be quickly located when you're ready to install.
When the download has finished, simply double click the file to launch the installer.
When you first launch the installer, you may get a security warning from Windows. The security warning below is from a computer running Windows XP. The Windows Vista security warning will be similar, but it will also have the "fade to black" background that is typical of requests for approval from Vista.
After several seconds of activity, you'll see the first (interactive) window from the installation wizard for the program. Go ahead and click the "Next" button to move on to the second window.
On the second window, you will have to accept the license agreement by clicking the box next to "I accept the terms of the license agreement." once you have clicked this check box, the "Next" button will change from grey to highlighted. Click the "Next" button again to move on to the third window.
On the third window of the installation wizard, some additional information is provided. The important information to get from this window, is that if you had a previous version of the program installed, you would need to uninstall it prior to installing version 5.86a. As this will not affect most users, you can simply click the "Next" button again to move on to the fourth window.
The fourth window of the installation wizard allows you to select the destination directory. Go ahead and click the "Next" button once again to accept the default destination location.
The fifth window of the installation wizard allows you to select the name of the folder that will be created in the start menu. Go ahead and click the "Next" button once again to accept the default.
Finally, click the "Next" button one last time and the installation of Eraser will actually begin.
You will see the progress bar move as the program installs.
Once you see this screen, you have successfully installed Eraser. Click the "Finish" button to start Eraser for the first time. Your computer may require a restart before you can begin using the program.
The first time Eraser runs, you will see the following screen:
This screen can be used for creating additional configuration options. For example, you could use the "Scheduler" option to configure Eraser to securely erase all of the files in the Windows "Temp" folder every night at midnight. As those configuration options are not the primary goal of this tutorial, you can simply click the red "X" to close this screen for now.
You will also notice that there is a new icon in the system tray:
This icon shows that Eraser is running in the background, which is important because having the program running in the background will allow you to right click on files for quickly erasing them.
When you need to permanently delete files, this can be done by selecting the file, right clicking on the file, and then selecting "Erase" from the popup menu (as shown below.)
After you click "Erase," you will see the following popup window:
The very first time you use Eraser to securely delete a file, you will want to click on the "Options" button to change the default settings. Once you have changed the default setting, you should not need to make any additional changes because Eraser will remember your last selection.
Click the "Options" button, so that you are presented with the following window:
From the Preferences window, you want to click so that choice number two (which corresponds to the entry for US DoD 5220.22M with 7 passes) is highlighted instead.
After your changes, the window should look like this:
Once you've highlighted the new preference, simply click the "OK" button to save your preferences and close this window. You should only need to perform this step the first time that you erase a file. Every subsequent time you can skip the step of clicking the "Options" button and changing the preferences.
Once you've clicked "OK" you should be returned to the previous window:
Click the "Yes" button to begin erasing the file
Once you have clicked the "Yes" button, you will see a new window that shows the progress as Eraser permanently deletes the file:
Once Eraser has completed securely deleting the file, it will pop up one final window which displays a report about the file (or files) that were erased. For the most part, the only purpose this window serves for most people is to let you know if Eraser was unable to delete the file or files. The file(s) that failed to delete correctly will be shown in the lower section of the window.
As briefly mentioned earlier, Eraser can erase multiple files (and folders) at once. By using Eraser, you can securely/permanently delete any private or important information that you no longer need to store on your computer.