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How to Wipe Laptop Securely?

Robert Kurt ~ Published: 08-Mar-2022 ~ Data Care ~ 5 Minutes Reading

Are you guys looking solution for How to wipe Laptop securely? If yes, then this is the right place to get the correct answer.
Before data is in transit, remove your sensitive information.

A laptop can know nearly everything about its owner. These details can be collected, including favorites websites, from each device’s memory as long as the settings allow it. But still, there are situations when the user needs to wipe laptop securely.

Once someone has your information, it is hard to fully remove their trace. The reset option within the settings might wipe the device for customers. Concerns about business devices are, however, far more prominent.

GDPR has greatly increased the penalty for data leaks, thus it’s critical to ensure sure a device is clean before disposal. A considerable amount of data remains after file deletion, which makes a device vulnerable if it comes into the wrong hands.

First Take Backup of Your Critical Data Before Wiping Laptop Securely

The first step is to make sure that you have an up – to – date backup of all of your files and folders. Even if you think you’ll never access the data, you could need to find it in archives in the far future. The most practical for you will depend on how much data you have to replicate. If you only need to back up a few files, and your internet connection is fast, then cloud backup is an alternative.

The most reliable and quickest option is to connect a second external hard drive to the laptop.

You’ll need to estimate how much storage you require. Right – click on the drive icon to see how much space it is using.

You must connect the external drive to the laptop to confirm if it is large enough to store all of your data.

Backup files, folders, and devices with an external hard drive connected to the laptop. File History is Windows 7’s Windows Backup functionality. System image backups and restores are included in Windows 10.

Wiping a Windows 7/Vista/XP PC

Wiping a Windows 7-based laptop should not be too difficult. Some devices may still be running the ancient OS after it was completely discontinued.

a DBAN-compatible program (link). It is available as an ISO image download, but to use it, you must extract it on a bootable USB or disc.

Insert this USB flash drive into the laptop, which you will then want to restart and boot from the BIOS screen. The next step is easy to follow the directions and wait for the reset process to securely erase everything. Reinstalling Windows 7 is now possible from any disc or USB stick containing installation files.

It does not necessary to be utilized on any particular operating system.

Wiping a Windows 8/8.1 laptop

Windows 8 and 8.1 make erasing a hard disc a cinch. Head to the Start screen, and then click on Settings from the Charms bar. Finally, uninstall Windows and reinstall it.
You should select the “thoroughly” option rather than the “fast” choice to ensure that everything gets erased.

Cleaning data from a Windows 10 laptop

Reset to default settings on Windows
Thanks to the built-in functionality, you may wipe the hard drive and reinstall the OS.

Open Settings > Update & Security > Recovery, then click Get Started. Select the relevant option. To restore Windows 10 to its pristine condition, you must follow the set of procedures that are selected for you. Choose the “Remove Everything” option to miraculously erase everything. If you have multiple hard drives installed on your laptop, you will be prompted to erase files from all drives; to protect yourself.

Finally, you have to clean the drives. This will ensure there are no recoverable files on the disc.

How to Wipe a Mac Machine

The process of wiping a Mac is fairly the same no matter which version of macOS you’re using – from Mountain Lion to Mojave. On previous Macs, you will need a system disc. The R key must be held down while restarting the Mac to enable the recovery partition.

Erase tab security options and then select 7-pass Erase. This will copy the info many times. The method has a few hours of completion however, it is really secure.

How to Wipe Disk in Linux

To completely erase any hard disc on a Linux-based system, you’ll have to use the command line.

In a terminal, type “sudo fdisk -l” This will list all of the linked storage drives. notice the drive’s device path.

Finally, run this command: ‘sudo dd if=/dev of=/dev/sdb bs=1M’ – and substitute ‘/dev/sdb/’ with the device path of the destination disc. This approach is known as “zeroing,” it overwrites the drive with zeroes.

There is considerable discussion on whether overwriting the drive with random information is safer, although it’s generally faster and suitable for most protection needs.

Final Words

In the above article we have mentioned solutions for How to wipe Laptop securely in brief. Users who are facing issues in the following process can refer to this article. We hope after reading this informative blog user will be able to overcome from the issue of How to wipe laptop securely.