Protect Your Data When You Recycle Your Laptop

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Protect Your Data When You Recycle Your Laptop

Posted at 22:21, 23/05/2008 by LauraWilliams

You've just bought a new laptop—congratulations! Here’s how to dispose of your old notebook without jeopardizing your data or the environment:

Step One: Save Your Files

You need to be careful not to transfer any spyware, malware, or viruses to your new notebook, so run a virus scan on your old one. After that, you can save all your data to a storage device or use a program like Mozy to back it all up for free

Step Two: Wipe the Slate Clean

Now that all your important data is stored in a safe place, you're free to erase all of the information on your old laptop. There are a few ways to do this: You can use free tools like Darik's Boot and Nuke

which creates an image on a USB drive or CD that will delete a hard drive's data on startup. You can also buy an easy-to-use data scrubber like Blancco Data Cleaner+

, which will completely erase your data with just a few clicks.

Check out Laptopmag.com for the rest.

See more like this: Storage Devices & Accessories, Computers, Laptops

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