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#31
Deleting or formatting erases nothing.
The only safe way to remove code from an infected or otherwise corrupted HD, or just to be safe, is to overwrite the data. The Quick Erase method is using zeroes.
The industry standards are:
Quick Erase (with zeroes) and DOD Standard are automated on free Partition Wizard bootable CD's Disk tab, which also allows a rightclick-partiition-specific wipe.
- Quick Erase: Fills hard drive with 0's
- Gutmann: 27 random-order passes using specific data combined with eight passes using random data.Due to changes in the different data encoding schemes now used by modern hard drives, Gutmann no longer recommends 35 passes. A few random passes should suffice.
- American DoD 5220-22.M: A seven-pass wipe using random characters, complements of characters, and random data streams.
- Canadian RCMP TSSIT OPS-II: 8 drive-wiping passes with a random byte in the overwrite sequence changed each time.
- PRNG Stream methods: Overwrites the drive with a stream from a Pseudo Random Number Generator (PRNG)
Partition Wizard Use the Bootable CD