Secure Delete

Pressing the “Delete” button while a file or folder is selected in Windows sends it to the Recycle Bin but it does not erase permanently. And even with the “shift-Delete” key combination, the files might still be recoverable. An application such as Secure Delete can help you get rid of files for good and make them impossible to recover.

Thanks to the wizard-based approach of this application, working with it is relatively easy. The first step is to add the files and folders to delete, either by browsing to their locations and adding them one by one, or by dragging and dropping them to the main window.

Aside from selecting the files and the directories that have to be erased, all you have to do is configure additional options to securely delete the files, which is not a mandatory step.

Secure Delete can take a few measures to make sure that the files you delete cannot be recovered. For instance, it can rename a file, giving it a random name, but this is just one of the available alternatives. Another option is to change the file date to the past, altering its metadata completely.

Adding random characters to random places is another security measure you can apply when deleting your files with this application. Last but not least, the content of the file can be reset before deletion or even overwritten. This way, you make sure that the file is impossible to recover.

Once the files are deleted, Secure Delete displays a notification message that contains the number of erased bytes and the number of files it processed. At this point, you will also find out if there are any errors and operation fails but, usually, everything runs smoothly and the files are successfully erased.

Secure Delete is easy to use and comes with options to help you make sure all the files you want to delete are gone forever. It is a simple application to use, so, if you are on the run for deleting files securely, this is a rather good choice.