deleting history for privacy

I have found bits and pieces of what to do, but i thought i'd ask to make sure i can do the best job i can.


My mom works from home, and connects to her employers server to access the files she needs to work. She uses a computer provided by the employer running Windows NT and must return it when she quits.

she is going to put in here notice soon, and has incriminating email correspondence with other employees about how corrupt the company has become. she is concerned that herself or someone she has correspondence with could get fired for some of the things discussed, since the Employer has remote access to all of their machines.


I have gained administrative priveleges to her system, and am looking to wipe clean any traces of email correspondence and internet history. how should i go about doing this to be sure i dont leave something behind?

I think this would make a really good guide in the Tips Tricks and How-To's forum, for anyone in a similar circumstance.

thank you

 

thank you very much

 

About that index.dat file, Halo... I use System Mechanic and the Safe Installer portion has brought to my attention some major invasion of privacy... like changes to the index.dat file under my cookies folder, changing my antivirus definitions, and even deleting links to web pages that other games have placed on my computer. Is this even legal? In a way, that's destroying data on my computer. What's up with that?

 

an eraser program is the way to go...

or ummm... format C:
Ooops did I mean to do that??
then a low leverl format...Hmmm i thought that would fix it

tell her to be VERY careful, becasue emails are stored on employer servers and they are probably on the other persons computer as well.......

 

If it is anything server based and the company cares about its data then they will have a backup regime. You will then need to ensure that all the backups are clean as well, which in general won't be possible.

Secondly, if you are using the company's Internet connection and they care about where you connect then there will be Firewall logs and security monitoring software. This also goes for company e-mail which would be monitored by any antivirus or e-mail scanning software. The logs in these cases would also be saved and possibly backed up.

It all depends on the company philosophy and the set-up for working remotely.

 

>Are you saying that System Mechanic is erasing your index.dat file thus removing cached url data ( plus god knows what else ) and that SM is altering your AV def files?

I don't know about SM (which I also use, good stuff), but windows Washer(tm) will overwrite the index.dat file with zeroes, plus, as an option, delete it and create an empty file (requires reboot). I think Spybot will do the same or similar.

Being paranoid, I use Spybot, then window washer, then Vopt, then Clean DIsk to sanitize the disks.
Oh, Clean disk (www.theabsolute.net/sware) is a disk sanitizer that overwrite all empty spae (including file slack space inteh pay version) with anything from one to NIS to Guttman data pattterns for security.

BTW, all these local security procedures begs the point of what other copies other sites, including the employer, might have of the data.