What is the best way to wipe hard drives of all information before disposing of old computers? Is there someone who offers this service?

This is a very good question given that most people have sensitive data on their computers which they would not want to fall into the wrong hands. Performing a simple format of the computer hard drive is unfortunately not sufficient to remove the data, as it simply marks the existing data as eligible to be overwritten (rather than actually removing the data). To properly delete the data you should write over the hard drive with random data several times, as this will help ensure that the data is no longer recoverable. There is a very good free utility available called Darik’s Boot And Nuke (or DBAN for short) which will wipe the hard drive and then write over the drive with random data. This is available for free download from: www.dban.org . Once it has been downloaded you will need to burn the ISO file to a CD or DVD. Once the ISO file has been burned, insert the CD into your old computer and boot from the disc. Proceed through the DBAN wizard and the data destruction process should begin.

A warning: only run DBAN on a system that you want to completely erase. This utility will completely wipe all data on the system, so make sure that you are totally certain that you wish to wipe the data and have a backup of any data you wish to keep.

If none of the above instructions made particular sense to you then your best (and least stressful) option would be to take the computer to a technician or service centre and they should be able to do the wiping process for you.

However, a possible alternative to wiping the drive would be to remove it from the computer and keep it for archival purposes. I generally recommend doing this instead of wiping and throwing out the hard drive since it means that you keep the original data on the drive (just in case it is needed in the future) and also don’t have to worry about the hassle of wiping the data. Removing the drive from the computer should be a relatively simple process, although make sure you take all necessary precautions and disconnect the computer from any power source before opening it to remove the drive.