How To Wipe A Flash Drive

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How To Wipe A Flash Drive

How To Wipe A Usb Stick
How To Wipe A Flash Drive Mac
How To Wipe A Flash Drive Clean
How To Wipe A Flash Drive Windows 10
How To Wipe A Flash Drive Clean Pc
How to capture video in kmplayer. Secure Erase and Sanitize both securely erase all user data and reset the SSD to out of box performance
Eraser is a free program that is recommended by the creators of DBAN (a bootable hard drive erasing tool).
Two methods to clear USB drive completely on Windows 10/8/7. To permanently clear a USB thumb drive and prevent recovery methods from retrieving information from it, you can write zeros to USB flash drive. It is one of the most popular methods. It replaces your regular, regular, readable data with zeros. For this task, there are two methods. Click on 'Drive Wiper' under Tools and select your USB Flash Drive. Set Wipe to ' Entire Drive (All data will be erased) '. In Security choose Simple, Advanced, or Complex Overwrite depending on the level of security you want your data to be wiped.
Sanitize
NOTE: Not all SanDisk SSD support Sanitize. Refer to the SanDisk SSD Dashboard to see if your SanDisk SSD support Sanitize
1. In the SSD Dashboard first select the Tools tab and then on the left side select Sanitize
2a. Secondary drive: If the SSD is not the system/boot drive (C: drive) you can simply select Erase now and follow the prompts to sanitize the SSD.

2b. Primary Drive: If the SSD is the system/boot drive (C: drive) you will need to choose Create USB Drive to create a bootable USB drive that can be used to sanitize the SSD
Once the Bootable USB drive has been create Restart your computer and select to Boot from the USB drive (all data on the USB drive will be destroyed so ensure no important data is on the USB drive)
Refer to your computer documentation for instructions on how to boot from a USB drive
Once you have booted into the bootable USB sanitize tool you will see a list of all drives identified by the model number and to the left will be the name of the drive as identified by the sanitize tool.
Enter the Device name (indicated above by the red circle) of the drive you want to sanitize
Once the drive is selected type Yto confirm and press enter
TypeNto exit the sanitize tool reboot the computer.

Secure Erase
1. In the SSD Dashboard first select the Tools tab and then on the left side select Secure Erase
2. Connect a USB drive and select that USB drive (all data on the USB drive will be destroyed so ensure no important data is on the USB drive)

3. After you have booted into the bootable USB Secure Erase tool you will see a list of all drives identified by the model number and to the left will be the name of the drive as identified by the Secure Erase tool.
4. Enter the Device name (indicated above by the red circle) of the drive you want to Secure Erase
How To Wipe A Usb StickNOTE: If you get an Invalid device type Yand press enter.
5. TypeY and press enter
NOTE: If the SSD is in a security frozen state you will be notified the security is frozen. To remove the security frozen state on a 2.5 formfactor SanDisk SSD, disconnect the power cable from the SSD and reconnect it and then continue with the secure erase.
6. Type N and reboot the computer.
When we talk about erasing data from any storage media, we often refer to formatting or deleting the files and folders from the storage media. However, data erasure essentially refers to deletion of data via overwriting with a pattern of 0s and 1s whereas, no overwriting is performed when you format or delete a drive or file. Overwriting the data destroys it permanently from the storage media. There are two ways in which one can permanently delete data from a USB Flash drive, namely by—
Erasing Individual or Selected files and folders
Wiping off an entire storage drive with a data erasure algorithm
How To Wipe A Flash Drive MacWiping is same as date erasure, but is done on a wider scale. When we say wipe, it refers to erasing the entire partition or disk volume, and not just one or two files. Wiping erases everything from the storage media permanently. It also erases previously deleted data, making its recovery impossible.

How To Wipe A Flash Drive CleanTo erase or permanently deleted data from USB Flash drive, you can use the following methods:
A Data Erasure Tool (To be brought on top)
Using CMD for data erasure is a bit tricky and you may accidentally end up deleting crucial files and folders (via typos). Therefore, use a secure data erasure software like BitRaser File Eraser, which lets you wipe the entire drive with the help of 3 international data erasure algorithms (selected one at a time) such as DoD 5220.22-M
Follow these steps to erase your USB drive with BitRaser File Eraser software:
Download, Install and run BitRaser File Eraser after connecting your USB drive to the PC
Go to ‘Settings'. Select the data erasure algorithm and verification method from the respective dropdowns
Go to Home and then click Erase Deleted Data
On the next screen, connected volumes and drive are displayed.
Select the USB drive to erase all contents of your USB drive in one go
If you are looking to erase only specific files/folders from your USB drive, follow the steps below
Click ‘Erase Files and Folders and on the next screen, click on Add items button
From the list, select the USB drive and expand it to select the specific file(s)
After you've made the selection, click on Erase Now button.
Use Command Prompt
Through command prompt, you can either wipe the entire drive or choose to erase individual files and folders beyond recovery in two different ways.
You can use Cipher command or SDelete utility from Microsoft that runs through CMD. Cipher wipes only the free or empty storage space while SDelete lets you wipe an entire volume and individual files or folders with DoD 5220.22-M data erasure standard.
a. Use Cipher to wipe free storage space on USB Drive

How To Wipe A Flash Drive CleanTo erase or permanently deleted data from USB Flash drive, you can use the following methods:
A Data Erasure Tool (To be brought on top)
Using CMD for data erasure is a bit tricky and you may accidentally end up deleting crucial files and folders (via typos). Therefore, use a secure data erasure software like BitRaser File Eraser, which lets you wipe the entire drive with the help of 3 international data erasure algorithms (selected one at a time) such as DoD 5220.22-M
Follow these steps to erase your USB drive with BitRaser File Eraser software:
Download, Install and run BitRaser File Eraser after connecting your USB drive to the PC
Go to ‘Settings'. Select the data erasure algorithm and verification method from the respective dropdowns
Go to Home and then click Erase Deleted Data
On the next screen, connected volumes and drive are displayed.
Select the USB drive to erase all contents of your USB drive in one go
If you are looking to erase only specific files/folders from your USB drive, follow the steps below
Click ‘Erase Files and Folders and on the next screen, click on Add items button
From the list, select the USB drive and expand it to select the specific file(s)
After you've made the selection, click on Erase Now button.
Use Command Prompt
Through command prompt, you can either wipe the entire drive or choose to erase individual files and folders beyond recovery in two different ways.
You can use Cipher command or SDelete utility from Microsoft that runs through CMD. Cipher wipes only the free or empty storage space while SDelete lets you wipe an entire volume and individual files or folders with DoD 5220.22-M data erasure standard.
a. Use Cipher to wipe free storage space on USB Drive
The cipher is mainly used for encryption (NTFS) but it can also be used through the command line to erase previously deleted and recoverable files and folders:
Connect USB drive and type following command in the CMD assuming E: is the USB drive letter
Cipher /w:E: and press Enter
Let it wipe your USB drive's empty storage once with a series of 0's (zero) then with a series of 255's and finally once again with a series of random numbers
b. Use SDelete to Erase Data from USB Flash Drive
SDelete is a small utility that works via command line and uses the DoD data erasure algorithm to destroy data present on USB flash drives. Follow below-mentioned steps to use SDelete for deleting data from USB Flash drive and as a disk wiping tool:
Download the SDelete (151 KB) program file from Microsoft's official website
Place it on the Desktop and then connect your USB flash drive
Assuming USB drive letter is E:, type the following command in the terminal followed by the ‘Enter' key
sdelete –p 5 E:
This command will erase all files from the E: drive with 5 passes of DoD algorithm. The passes are defined with –p parameter and you can choose n number of passes as per your choice
To wipe a specific or individual file, replace E:* with E:FILE_NAME
To delete a directory, type sdelete –s –p 5 E:FOLDER_NAME
Encrypt Drive or Data
Encryption is a great tool to safeguard data from unauthorized access and for data destruction. Data erasure tools including command line and software-based erasure methods cannot destroy data from NAND flash-based storages i.e. SSDs. The only way to secure data and sanitize data in SSD is encryption. By deleting the encryption key, the data cannot be accessed which is equivalent to data destruction.
The same process can be used for deleting data from USB Flash drive.
How To Wipe A Flash Drive Windows 10For encryption, you can use BitLocker or similar encryption tools in Windows to protect and destroy your data.
How To Wipe A Flash Drive Clean PcConclusionTo permanently delete data from USB Flash drive or other flash storages and hard drives, use a reliable data erasure software such as ‘BitRaser File Eraser', as mentioned in this blog post. This erasure software is safe to use and helps you sanitize data from all kinds of storage media. Besides, the software also works as a privacy safeguarding tool and helps destroy confidential user data that's stored in the form of internet activities, system traces, and application traces.
You may also use the command prompt or encryption method to destroy and safeguard your data. However, the aforesaid methods require some level of technical knowledge of computing and thus, not recommended for all users.