NEC "Advanced Personal Computer"? & Secure data removal

[Marvin Johnston]

My understanding is that one of the specifications for removing secure
information from a hard disk requires writing zeros to the disk six or
seven times. Norton Utilities (old version) had diskwipe and filewipe
where you could specify how many times to write to the disk.

Some time ago, there was a discussion of how to recover data that had
been overwritten. The only thought I have is that it would take some
specialized equipment to read the disk and would take the hysterisis of
writing to the disk into account. My guess is that the magnetic field
would be such that after six or seven writes, the prior data would no
longer be recoverable.


>         Which brings up another thought. how would one go about making sure 
> that data is securely wiped from a drive of a classic machine, without 
> physically destroying it? So it could be donated & reused?
> 
> -- 
> ---   Dave Woyciesjes