Winclear?

[Drunk_Squid]

I started this thread because I was wondering if anyone else has bought this program, WINCLEAR. What do you think about it? Is it a scam? Any help would be greatly appreciated, thanks.

Edit

I didn't see a specific PC subforum so here you go.

[overwatch]

To be honest the only way to wipe information from a computer is by a hard drive formatt. Basic deleting does not always remove the data, only rewriting new data over the old is the way to permantly remove it. Seriously, the windows delete internet history utility should be more than enough.

Other popular methods include; sticking a magnet to your hard drive and incinerating your hard drive.

[Drunk_Squid]

So when you format a hard drive, it just rewrites all new information over the old data that can't be rmeoved?

[overwatch]

As far as I know (though don't hold me to this) formatting does remove all data (all the charges are returned to a set state). Data shredding programs just scramble the posetive and negative charges on the drive, however if you revers the ramdom scrambling program (as a computer it can never be purly random) the data can be retreived.

out of interst what are you trying to lose?

[Storm Strife]

To be honest the only way to wipe information from a computer is by a hard drive formatt. Basic deleting does not always remove the data, only rewriting new data over the old is the way to permantly remove it.

Actually, I believe that even formatting your HDD isn't enough to remove data from it. Computer savvy people can still restore that data and gain access to it. If you REALLY want to make sure someone doesn't restore data, you're better off using something like DBAN, although, even that won't stop determined people with lots of time and money.

Now back to the OP - it looks like something you can get that works just as well, but for free. You're probably better off using CCleaner, CleanUp!, and Windows built in Disk Cleanup.

[Manhattan_Project_2000]

This all depends on who you are trying to protect yourself from. If it's the police, or FBI, lots of luck. If it's your parents/significant other/whatever, and they are not professional-level computer users, all you have to do is go into internet options and tell it to dump your cache and your history. If your parents/significant other/whatever is in fact computer savvy, that's when you should bother with one of these programs.

[Eris]

To be honest the only way to wipe information from a computer is by a hard drive formatt. Basic deleting does not always remove the data, only rewriting new data over the old is the way to permantly remove it. Seriously, the windows delete internet history utility should be more than enough.

That is not at all a good way of removing data from your hard drive. Reformatting the hard drive will only re-write the file system tree, but leave all the old data until new files have been created in the same space. So someone with time and resources could piece the stuff back together again.

You need to write over the entire hard drive (should take a long time to do), ideally several times in different bit patterns. The UNIX utility shred can achieve this. But I estimate it would take a day or two on a moderately large hard drive.

One rewrites is enough to keep out most people.
Multiple rewrites is enough to destroy sensitive information. Most governments would destroy sensitive data that would pose a security risk were it leaked this way. This isn't 103% irreversible, sufficiently advanced technology could theoretically restore information. But it would take forever and cost a small fortune.

Heating the hard drive to it's Curie point is the only way to irreversibly destroy the information thereon. It will effectively and irreversibly demagnetize the entire drive (but also probably melt it beyond recognition.) I repeat: Acid baths, cutting them into pieces, crushing them, rewriting them a thousand times, submitting them to intense magnetic fields -- none will irreversibly remove information there on. This is the only way.

[Drunk_Squid]

out of interst what are you trying to lose?

Malicious and/or sensitive data.

[Storm Strife]

Malicious and/or sensitive data.

Define malicious...

[Drunk_Squid]

Virus. On my other machine.

[Storm Strife]

Winclear won't get rid of viruses and the like. It's my understanding that Winclear just removes things that show what you've done on your PC. For things like viruses and malware, you need an anti-malware program, and an anti-virus program.

Personally, I recommend that you download avast! Antivirus, Spybot: Search & Destroy, and Windows Defender.

[overwatch]

I would also recommend AVG, the basic package is free to use, but don't run two different antivirus programs together (spybot and windows defender are not anitvirus, but avast and avg are, so pick one)
You could also use a firewall program to prevent further infections from the internet, Zone Alarm is another free basic package - but the same rule for anti virus is here - only have one working. Windows does have its own firewall, but it is not that good.
You could also try out Ad-aware a free program that hunts out tracking cookies and the like