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Carl Hitchens

Q: Where is secure empty trash in El Capitan

Where is secure empty trash in El Capitan?

MacBook Pro (15-inch Mid 2009), Mac OS X (10.7.5)

Posted on Oct 4, 2015 11:10 PM

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Q: Where is secure empty trash in El Capitan

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  • by Terence Devlin,

    Terence Devlin Terence Devlin Oct 4, 2015 11:13 PM in response to Carl Hitchens
    Level 10 (139,480 points)
    iLife
    Oct 4, 2015 11:13 PM in response to Carl Hitchens

    It's gone. Pathfinder has a similar feature if you're desperate for it:

     

    http://www.cocoatech.com/pathfinder/

  • by Children's Author,

    Children's Author Children's Author Oct 13, 2015 8:19 AM in response to Carl Hitchens
    Level 1 (10 points)
    Oct 13, 2015 8:19 AM in response to Carl Hitchens

    The reasoning that Apple, Inc. gives for removing the “Secure Empty Trash” button in its El Capitan OS update is: 

     

    Description: An issue existed in guaranteeing secure deletion of Trash files on some systems, such as those with flash storage. This issue was addressed by removing the "Secure Empty Trash" option.

    CVE-ID

    CVE-2015-5901 : Apple

    Reference:: About the security content of OS X El Capitan - Apple Support

     

    It might sound logical to Apple, but to me that seems illogical. It is like Ford saying, “We could not guarantee that seatbelts would work properly in the Fusion, so we removed seatbelts from all of our vehicles.”

     

    Therefore, one must wonder if something else is at play here.

     

    Did Apply secretly comply with a government request to remove the “Secure Empty Trash” button from its operating system because it made it difficult to recover files from computers? If such is the case, then Apple’s breakthrough Super Bowl Mac ad of why 1984 won’t be like 1984, was just propaganda. Apple has made 1984 come true. If you have not read George Orwell’s book titled 1984, perhaps you should. Big brother IS watching…

  • by Terence Devlin,

    Terence Devlin Terence Devlin Oct 13, 2015 8:39 AM in response to Children's Author
    Level 10 (139,480 points)
    iLife
    Oct 13, 2015 8:39 AM in response to Children's Author

    Paranoid much?

     

    The problem is that it's impossible to completely erase material on Flash Drives. That's inherent tin the nature of flash drives, nothing to do with Apple, it's just how these things work.

     

    So if Apple wanted to facilitate spying on you they would actually leave the option there so you would think you were securely deleting the material, but actually leaving it available to be easily recovered.

     

    By removing the option they are letting you clearly know that what you want is not an available option. If you want to make sure your information is gone from a flash drive, destroy the drive.

     

    In the meantime, keep taking the tablets. They help you know

  • by Children's Author,Helpful

    Children's Author Children's Author Oct 17, 2015 8:58 AM in response to Eric Root
    Level 1 (10 points)
    Oct 17, 2015 8:58 AM in response to Eric Root

    In my opinion, a better solution would have been for Apple to write a code that adds the “Secure Empty Trash” feature, but also includes a friendly pop-up reminder that appears whenever flash storage devices are erased (emptied from the trash). Such a notice might say:

     

    Due to their design, Flash Storage Devices do not qualify for “Secure Deletion.”

     

    Personally, I would prefer to have some secure file deletion, especially on my Mac hard drive, as opposed to none.

  • by jedito,

    jedito jedito Oct 22, 2015 9:44 AM in response to Children's Author
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Oct 22, 2015 9:44 AM in response to Children's Author

    Secure Empty Trash was very handy for getting rid of documents with personal information. To completely remove the feature because of a limited issue, instead of solving that issue, like disabling the feature specific to flash drives, is just lazy. Apple, please bring it back.

     

    To top it off, this is marked as "Solved" with a useless link (How to securely delete files in OS X 10.11 ‘El Capitan’ (2)) to instructions that tell a user to use Secure Empty Trash in Finder, to securely delete files. There is no Secure Empty Trash in Finder right now, hence this thread. smh