AI translated

If you intend to throw away, give away, or sell your computer, smartphone, or tablet, there is a major problem you may not pay attention to: if you do not properly erase the information on these devices, you may become a victim of identity theft attacks.

Computer users should note that, in order to destroy information they do not want another person to have, deleting files using ordinary system tools is not enough, and these tools do not eliminate the threats and attacks of theft. Instead, users must clean their devices much more thoroughly and carefully.

Accordingly, in order to maintain information security on home users' computers, we will mention several methods of erasing data.

A solution for cleaning a computer's hard drive

Deleting files and programs and then emptying all the data from the Recycle Bin is almost a useless task for a user who intends to throw away their computer; it can be said that anyone can easily recover data deleted in this way using ordinary, readily available tools.

Even if a user reformats their hard drive, someone who wants to can still recover its deleted data; accordingly, this can be a serious issue.
In 2003, two graduate students at the MIT Computer Science Laboratory bought 158 used hard drives from eBay and other sources. Of these, the data on only 12 drives had been properly erased. Although nearly 60 percent of these hard drives had been reformatted and there were no files on approximately 45 percent of them, these drives could not even be installed on a computer. Nevertheless, using a series of special tools, the students were able to recover their data. They discovered more than 5,000 credit card numbers, personal and corporate financial records, medical records, and personal emails.

To maintain the security of their data, users should use a disk-wiping program (especially a program approved by standards). These programs overwrite the entire hard drive several times with different data, providing assurance that the original data cannot be recovered at all. Of course, when using these programs, users must be patient, because wiping an entire hard drive may take several hours.

If the user uses a Mac, they can use Disk Utility, which is built into Apple systems. This tool can be found in the Applications/Utility folder. Third-party programs can also be used for this task; these programs overwrite the contents of a file several times and completely wipe the local hard drive, network hard drives, and CD drives.

Cleaning mobile phones, smartphones, and tablets

Smartphones and tablets place the user's entire life, from contact lists, emails, records of calls they have made and calls made to them, to social media information and so on, into one small package. It is therefore very important that the user make sure that others cannot gain access to this information.

One solution to this problem is for the user to delete their applications and contact information one by one, but the likelihood of doing this effectively is almost zero. Therefore, the user should completely reset their phone in such a way that its data is deleted and it is returned to the factory default settings.

How to do this depends on the type of operating system and sometimes on the user's device. Accordingly, the instructions given in the report are general instructions that should work for most devices, but in any case it is better for the user to also look at their device's manual to make sure of what they are doing.

Cleaning the Android operating system

For versions before Android 4.0, the user must press the Menu key from the Home screen and select Settings/Privacy/Factory data reset. This will display a warning to the user, in which they must click

Reset phone.

Also, if the user has an SD card in their phone and does not want to use its data in their next phone, they should make sure they have also selected the Erase SD card option.

For Android 4.0 or later versions, the user must go to Settings, look for Backup and reset, select it, and then click Factory data reset on the next page. At this stage, they will encounter a warning window containing a list of the user accounts they are currently signed in to.

Cleaning computers with the iOS operating system

Users of iOS version 5 who want to clean their system must go to Settings/General/Reset and select Erase all Content and Settings. Of course, this action is specific to iOS version 5, and this process may be somewhat different for other versions of this operating system.

Cleaning the Windows Phone 7 operating system

To clean the Windows Phone 7 operating system, the user must go to the Home screen and click Application Menu Key; then select Settings/ System/About/ and tap the Reset your phone button.

Cleaning the BlackBerry operating system

Users of the BlackBerry operating system who want to clean the operating system of their device must go to the Options/Security options/General settings settings section, click the menu, and then select the Wipe Handheld option.
Now the user can sell, give away, or throw away their device with peace of mind.