Before you sell your computer, smash the hard drive, says Which?
The only surefire way to stop criminals stealing data from secondhand computers is to destroy the hard drive, a study by Which? Computing magazine has warned. Even though people think they have wiped data from machines before they sell them on auction sites or put them onto rubbish tips, the files remain on the hard drives – and can contain vital information such as bank details and other personal data sufficient for identity theft. They can be recovered using specialist software that is widely available. The magazine recovered 22,000 "deleted" files from eight computers which it bought from the auction site eBay – demonstrating that normal deletion is insufficient to remove the data. Criminals source used computers in order to find such useful data, the magazine warned.
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Before you sell your computer, smash the hard drive, says Which?
Before you sell your computer, smash the hard drive, says Which?
The only surefire way to stop criminals stealing data from secondhand computers is to destroy the hard drive, a study by Which? Computing magazine has warned. Even though people think they have wiped data from machines before they sell them on auction sites or put them onto rubbish tips, the files remain on the hard drives – and can contain vital information such as bank details and other personal data sufficient for identity theft. They can be recovered using specialist software that is widely available. The magazine recovered 22,000 "deleted" files from eight computers which it bought from the auction site eBay – demonstrating that normal deletion is insufficient to remove the data. Criminals source used computers in order to find such useful data, the magazine warned. "PCs contain more valuable personal information than ever as people increasingly shop online, use social networking sites and take digital photos," said Sarah Kidner, editor of Which? Computing. "Such information could bring identity thieves a hefty payday." One Which? reader, Alexander Skipwith, had to pay £100 to get his hard drive back from a man purporting to be in Latvia: he emailed Skipwith with a personal photo to show that he had access to his hard drive, which contained bank statements and a mortgage application. Skipwith had previously been told that his faulty hard drive would be wiped of personal information when it was replaced by a computer manufacturer.
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Before you sell your computer, smash the hard drive, says Which?
Science Weekly podcast: Chris Bishop discusses the Royal Institution’s quest for the ultimate computer
For our end of term science trip, we take the podcast on the road to London's Royal Institution . In the Faraday lecture theatre, we speak to Chris Bishop who is hosting this year's Christmas lectures. The theme this year is making the ultimate computer . We also visit the Science Museum's new exhibition on GM technology - Future Foods . Tim Lang , Professor of food technology at London's City University , tells us why the GM industry in the US is at risk. James Randerson is the Guardian's only science correspondent who remembered to bring his permission slip allowing him to be unchained from his desk. Feel free to post your comments about the programme on the blog below. You can also join our Facebook group , where you can scrawl your thoughts on our wall.
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Science Weekly podcast: Chris Bishop discusses the Royal Institution's quest for the ultimate computer
Read me first: When you lose a piece of kit, the real loss is the data it contains
Bruce Schneier: Everything you own should be backed up regularly. Not just your computer, but your PDA and mobile too
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Read me first: When you lose a piece of kit, the real loss is the data it contains
Read me first: When you lose a piece of kit, the real loss is the data it contains
Bruce Schneier: Everything you own should be backed up regularly. Not just your computer, but your PDA and mobile too
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Read me first: When you lose a piece of kit, the real loss is the data it contains
Ask Jack: November 27 2008
$hf_mi$? I am alarmed at the amount of space on my Windows hard drive used by the $hf_mig$ folder. Can I safely delete this, please? Alan Simpson JS: No, these are Windows updates and patches. You can, however, delete any folders that start with $NTUninstall. If you do, you will not be able to uninstall any updates that cause problems, but you're unlikely to want to uninstall anything that's more than a month old.
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Ask Jack: November 27 2008
Lenovo will let you kill a notebook with a text message
Lenovo is working with Phoenix on a BIOS that will let you disable a ThinkPad notebook PC by sending it an SMS text message. The feature should be available early next year, reports TG Daily . The story says: The lockdown will happen immediately if a notebook is turned on or, when it is turned off, the next time the system signs on to a cellular network. To reactivate the disabled PC, a user needs to enter a pre-set passcode created during notebook startup. Since not many people have notebooks with built in Sims, it would be more useful if you could disable a notebook over the internet. Maybe you can…. It would also be more useful if every notebook PC had this sort of feature, as it would tend to discourage notebook theft. However, bear in mind that it doesn't protect your data, because someone can always remove the hard drive and read it with a different PC -- unless the data is encrypted. The article also doesn't say whether the SMS simply triggers a BIOS password. There are ways around those.... Computing Gadgets Computer security guardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2008 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds
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Lenovo will let you kill a notebook with a text message
Lenovo will let you kill a notebook with a text message
Lenovo is working with Phoenix on a BIOS that will let you disable a ThinkPad notebook PC by sending it an SMS text message. The feature should be available early next year, reports TG Daily . The story says: The lockdown will happen immediately if a notebook is turned on or, when it is turned off, the next time the system signs on to a cellular network.
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Lenovo will let you kill a notebook with a text message
A firewall that doesn’t stay turned on
Often when I switch on my computer, I get a message that the Windows Firewall is not turned on. As I never turn it off, I do not know how this happens. Bill Ross The two things most likely to turn off the Windows Firewall are (a) security suites from other companies; and (b) malware. Reboot your PC and run Panda's Anti Rootkit . Next, download and run the Kaspersky Virus Removal Tool . You should also check that you have all Windows Updates installed, and that third-party software is patched. Secunia offers a scanning tool for this, and I recommend running the desktop version, Personal Software Inspector.
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A firewall that doesn't stay turned on
Ask Jack: November 20 2008
Hibernation revisited Last week, you mentioned "setting your PC to hibernate" to save power. My limited knowledge of technology jargon doesn't include hibernation. Edward Johnson JS: Hibernation implies a long sleep with a reduction in the use of resources. You can set a PC either to go into standby mode (sleep) or to hibernate when you are not using it. If you set the PC to hibernate it writes whatever is in its memory to a big file (hiberfil.sys) on your hard drive. That way, you won't lose anything if there is a power cut
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Ask Jack: November 20 2008