Eraser

As most IT pros know, when you delete a file from a Windows system, it doesn’t take the time to wipe all the data from that file on the disk. Instead, it simply erases the first letter of the file name and marks the cluster as free space. This capability is great for performance, but it also leaves open an alarming opportunity: If someone can access the drive, either physically or via a different user account, they can scrape your disks for sensitive information.

If you really want to wipe clean a disk or file—you need a tool to help you do the job right. Eraser is one such tool.

Eraser is free, open source and released under the GNU General Public License.
Once you’ve installed Eraser, you can launch it from its system-tray icon or use the right-click context menu-extensions in Internet Explorer as well as the normal start-menu launch. The context menu gives you options to securely delete or move the target file or directory (moving files can leave imprints of their contents on the file system in the same way that deleted files do).

General preferences for Eraser include whether statistical and error reports or logs should be generated, what to do with locked files, which shortcuts you want in your context menu along with what erasure technique should be used as a default, and whether the scheduler should run at Windows startup.

So whether you need help with regulatory compliance or just want to protect your old, “deleted” sensitive information from prying eyes, you might want to consider adding Eraser to your toolbox.

http://eraser.heidi.ie/