Deleting browsing history

Does anyone know if it is possible to permanetly delete all browsing history so that it is unrecoverable? I heard something about starting pc in safe mode and finding a folder with all browsing history stored.

According to IT forensics, you should be able to recover whatever the data from your hard disc even after many data wipes....

I read before that the only way to permanently ensure that somebody cannot recover data from a pc is by destroying the pc.

But people sell secondhand computers so I'm sure there must be a way of doing. it. I'm also sure you will get more useful replies than mine

I use a piece of software called CCleaner. It promises to delete all history files etc with 35 wipes. The only other option would be to completely re-install Windows. There's probably far better software available but you'd have to pay for it.

PM1234 said:

I read before that the only way to permanently ensure that somebody cannot recover data from a pc is by destroying the pc.

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I presume you mean destroying the hard disk or other non volatile storage media? You certainly don't have to destroy a full computer to ensure that your data is never recovered!

For general use you can use the normal browser clear history options and maybe also something like [broken link removed] to (relatively) securely erase unused disk space. When selling a computer on if you are not going to retain the hard disk then you should at least use one or more secure erase tools to erase data. See here for example:

[broken link removed]

The default in IE is to save 20 days of history so you can reduce that to 0 or 1 for example. Then something like CC can wipe it, or you can use and addin (IEPRO) that clears it automatically when you close IE.

Theres a lot urban myth about IT forensics. Most of which are theory and are almost impossible in real life. They can recover data from a disk that have been deleted, and formatted, even multiple formats. As this doesn't delete data. But (as far as I know) most people or companies are not going to recover anything from after data has been overwritten by multiple writes, physical destruction, or magnetic degaussing.

Bit pointless worrying about this if its not protected to start with. The first step is to have your computer, and data protected by encryption. Otherwise the data is open for anyone to see if they get to it, before you wipe it. If the computer gets stolen or hacked for example. Have a look at truecrypt and similar. If the data is encrypted and then securely wiped, I doubt anyone could get it back.

Delete the history and run Disk Defragmenter...

That should cover you unless you have the fbi after you.....

Why Disk Defragmenter...

Maybe he meant 'disk clean up' of which defragging is an element, but which also includes clearing of temp. internet files etc. ?

Mind you, you can do that through tools/internet options on your browser anyway.

I would have thought defragging would actually make it easier to recover data. As it would move it all together on the disk. But maybe theres more to it than that.

Yeah, You can do all of this manually. I just find it easier and quicker to use on of those tools, especially if you are using a couple of browsers, IE, Firefox and a lot of different applications. It probably helps the performance of the machine and browser a tiny bit too. I also find is a good idea to clear all passwords etc, as it forces you to reenter and thus remember them.

aircobra19 said:

I would have thought defragging would actually make it easier to recover data..

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Not if the file is deleted first , it only moves around the non-deleted files so will overwrite the deleted ones...

Ah ok I get it. Worthwhile so. Though a utility that wipes empty disk space with muliple writes would be more comprehensive. Though I think personally that even one overwrite of the data is enough. As the old data is gone at that point.

We did some data recovery in college and it was only moderately successfully in recovering from a format. We couldn't recover from anything that was overwritten, though obviously we didn't really know what we were doing.

Deleting a file on a computer doesn't actually remove it from the disk, all it does is indicate to the operating system that the space the file occupied is now free and can be used if it wants to, this is why it's possible to retrieve files which have been deleted. Using defrag might delete what was there before as it may move something else into that space. If all you're worried about is other people seeing that you were
what you were browsing o) then Firefox allows you to set an option to clear your history when you close it but other than that you can just clear the history manually each time.