How safe is it to sell my computer to a stranger?

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ReaderGuy

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I put a listing on craigslist to sell a netbook I had. I put it at $200 and this guy offered me $300 over paypal if I would send it to him since hes in another state. I just thought this seems fishy as why would anyone offer me $300 for an old NETBOOK?? You could go to the store and buy a cheap computer for that. I did restore the system to its factory settings so it seems brand new, and none of my data can be directly accessed.

But I know that this data is still within my hard drive as 1s and 0s until the computer overwrites it with something else. I dont think i ever did anything real important on it, but sometime in the past, perhaps a year ago or more, I had a password application on it, and I may have accessed a bank account or something. Is it easy for people to extract information from the hard drive?

Thanks!
 
Well, firstly you cannot completely delete all data without nuking the hard drive totally (with something like Secure Erase - http://cmrr.ucsd.edu/people/Hughes/SecureErase.shtml or Boot and Nuke - http://www.dban.org/) and then reinstalling the operating system. I would not say that these are "newbie" friendly though... if you are not already au fair with the technical side of your system then I actually would not recommend using them as if it goes wrong and you don't have some technical ability, it will render your system useless.

So, if you are up for it, nuke the disk and reinstall the OS

If you are not, then go with your gut on this guy, and if it sounds dodgy, don't risk it. Just sell it to someone local who you can meet to handover and dont have the hassle of postage
 
Well you say you've never had anything important on it so I wouldn't worry.

When you delete something on your computer it's not really deleted, what happens is that the operating system just removes the access path to the file an changes the state of the space it takes up as available (to write over). So technically the file hasn't gone anywhere and any basic recovery software can find & recover them (providing parts of the file hasn't already been written over).

I'll be honest that internet history and saved data is accessible, but realistically it's unlikely since your hard drive is constantly adding new data all the time. Anyway I don't think there would be any important information anybody would be able to steal from what you say.
 
If the person knows what they are doing, yeah they could retrieve information. I'd never sell an old computer to a stranger without removing the hard drive.
 
Lady X said:
Well, firstly you cannot completely delete all data without nuking the hard drive totally (with something like Secure Erase - http://cmrr.ucsd.edu/people/Hughes/SecureErase.shtml or Boot and Nuke - http://www.dban.org/) and then reinstalling the operating system.

To be honest just a simple low level format is more than enough; Format /u in good old DOS, but Windows gives you the option nowadays when installing.

You can use a tool called CCleaner that has an Erase free space option that will thoroughly wipe all deleted files in your free space, and any other file you want to erase too, but depending on what erase method you use (Gutmann being the most secure with 35 passes) and what space you have it will take some time.
 
If you are going to sell it, I'd agree with 9006, and suggest using CCleaner. I use it myself every once in a while to get rid of junk, as it was formerly called Crap Cleaner. Great program, and it's free.
 
VanillaCreme said:
If you are going to sell it, I'd agree with 9006, and suggest using CCleaner. I use it myself every once in a while to get rid of junk, as it was formly called Crap Cleaner. Great program, and it's free.

Yeah, it really is a cool app. It also has a drive wiper built in too with different write options.

But this is just for the more paranoid, like I said earlier; a simple low level format (1 pass) is enough to render most tools useless. Only the most sophisticated tools that use complex sequence building algorithms (that aren't generally available for public use) can make any sense of low level format, but even this would literally take years for a reasonably large hard drive since it's such a lengthy process, so lengthy in fact that the time taken wouldn't be worth the information it might (but most likely not) recover.
 
9006 said:
VanillaCreme said:
If you are going to sell it, I'd agree with 9006, and suggest using CCleaner. I use it myself every once in a while to get rid of junk, as it was formly called Crap Cleaner. Great program, and it's free.

Yeah, it really is a cool app. It also has a drive wiper built in too with different write options.

But this is just for the more paranoid, like I said earlier; a simple low level format (1 pass) is enough to render most tools useless. Only the most sophisticated tools that use complex sequence building algorithms (that aren't generally available for public use) can make any sense of low level format, but even this would literally take years for a reasonably large hard drive since it's such a lengthy process, so lengthy in fact that the time taken wouldn't be worth the information it might (but most likely not) recover.

I just used ccleaner to write over the free space on my hard drive. There wasnt anything else since I restored it to factory settings. Thanks.

nerdygirl said:
Hard drive issues aside... I am more concerned about a potential scam from somebody wanting to pay you via paypal. Craigslist, itself, warns you not to accept money through paypal!

http://www.craigslist.org/about/scams

Yeah I just told that person no. And I didnt know craigslist said that... I have two other people that emailed me about it so Ill go with one of them.
 
Why would they warn against PayPal? Because the option is there to retract a payment? PayPal is usually reliable.
 
I've never had an issue with PayPal.

I always end up just taking my old computers to the city drop off recycling station. I drop off everything but the hard drive which I physically dismantle.
 
VanillaCreme said:
They do? Or the people that use it?

Exactly. You know it's not just PayPal that's involved in scams, more or less anything to do with money can be exploited somehow, it just takes someone to find it out.
 
I'm not sure why Craigslist warns against Paypal, but the fact that you can retract a payment on Paypal makes it pretty easy to scam people. As somebody who sells on eBay sometimes, I have had to deal with knowing that buyers can pretend they never received an item and make a claim on Paypal... so then they end up with both- the item and the money refunded to them.
 
Two separate stories about eBay.

When I was a teenager, I was becoming a Genesis fan, and I hadn't seen any of the live Peter Gabriel concert footage. It's now all available in remastered format on DVD, which I have (surround sound, too!), but back in the late 90's, it was hard to get ahold of.

This eBay seller was offering an original and remastered VHS tape of early Genesis footage, with Peter Gabriel. I was so excited, I thought I'd be able to actually see it. Nope. It came and the picture and sound was horrible...and the whole thing was badly put together, it looked like someone with a damaged printer did it. Cost about $40. Never again.

Then, another Genesis story. In 2010, I was trying to collect all the Genesis albums on vinyl. I have them all now, but I ordered A Trick Of The Tail (1976 studio album) on vinyl from eBay...seller promised that it was "like new."

I receive it, and not only is it scratched, but it is badly warped and won't play. I request a refund, and the seller promises to refund me if I send back the vinyl, which I do. Then I'm out shipping and postage (which was also supposed to be refunded), and, nope, my money is not refunded. And eBay says I can't do anything about it.

So eBay gets none of my service anymore. It's too easy to scam people. I use Amazon Marketplace.
 
LeaningIntoTheMuse said:
Two separate stories about eBay.

When I was a teenager, I was becoming a Genesis fan, and I hadn't seen any of the live Peter Gabriel concert footage. It's now all available in remastered format on DVD, which I have (surround sound, too!), but back in the late 90's, it was hard to get ahold of.

This eBay seller was offering an original and remastered VHS tape of early Genesis footage, with Peter Gabriel. I was so excited, I thought I'd be able to actually see it. Nope. It came and the picture and sound was horrible...and the whole thing was badly put together, it looked like someone with a damaged printer did it. Cost about $40. Never again.

Then, another Genesis story. In 2010, I was trying to collect all the Genesis albums on vinyl. I have them all now, but I ordered A Trick Of The Tail (1976 studio album) on vinyl from eBay...seller promised that it was "like new."

I receive it, and not only is it scratched, but it is badly warped and won't play. I request a refund, and the seller promises to refund me if I send back the vinyl, which I do. Then I'm out shipping and postage (which was also supposed to be refunded), and, nope, my money is not refunded. And eBay says I can't do anything about it.

So eBay gets none of my service anymore. It's too easy to scam people. I use Amazon Marketplace.

I too got burned about 8 years ago but I still use it. The problem for me was that I was impatient and didn't research it all properly, eBay has improved over the years. But obviously if you're looking to buy something brand new or rare then there's more of a chance to get scammed, in any case eBay and PayPal offers refunds for various situations like these.
 
Good luck with that. I know quite a few people that have had cast iron cases for a refund rejected by both eBay and Paypal. Their response was to contact your credit card issuer or the bank. The bank/CC issuer then says to contact Paypal because the payment went through them.

Paypal is a necessary evil when it comes to auction sites, but you've got far more security just using a credit card in all other circumstances.

Having said this, I've been buying items online since 1993 and I've never been scammed. There have been attempts, but they've all been unsuccessful. I find that if you are careful and understand that if something looks to good to be true, then it probably is, then everything will be OK.
 
If you are worried about sensitive data of yours being found, sell the computer without a hard drive. Otherwise, don't let it worry you. The longer you spend trying to change your hard drive, the more the value of your computer will depreciate. Time is money after all.
 

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