index.dat, history.dat and similar pests

index.dat

New Member
Greetings.

As my username implies, it has recently come to my attention Microsoft Windows keeps a hard to delete and (to an extent, as all things) permanent record of every website I visit, every URL I type, along with pictures and graphics taken from the pages I visit.

I see this in a negative light, in the sense some of my dealings on my computer should remain private. This applies to a wide array of things from my shopping preferences to private conversations with my girlfriend.

Because I didn`t want to put up with it, I used CCleaner to delete those files. I have re-formatted my computer a couple of times, the last of which in late October. I re-installed Windows but, when running Eraser to clean unused space on my drive, there`s a whole list of files it cannot delete. Among these are a whole batch of protected files and also some others like several index.dat and Mozilla Firefox history files.

My question is this: these files I cannot delete, are they the ones from when before I re-installed Windows? After re-formatting, if I run Eraser to delete all unused disc space, do I get rid of all previous index.dat, Firefox history files, etc?
If not, how can I completely erase everything I had on the drive and start anew?
 
Hi index.dat :)

how can I completely erase everything I had on the drive and start anew?

You could use DBAN, that will wipe everything on your drive. So make some backups first !!! :shock:
 
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