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How do I delete locked items in my trash

Ever since I downloaded files from a friend's usb I have been unable to remove anything from my trash. I seem to have 'secure trash' fixed on my computer - would it be better to remove this and how please. I press empty trash and the Secure Empty Trash pops up so press Empty and then the note about locked items pops up and asks if I want to delete all items or just unlocked ones. I have pressed both at different times and nothing works. I always have 9123 items locked into my trash. Help please. Have tried calling support and I'm told to please check the number. Tried to type my number/s into their support box so they can phone me back and they won't accept any numbers with or without area codes. This is hard work. Please help.

MacBook Pro

Posted on Sep 30, 2012 9:53 PM

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Question marked as Best reply

Posted on Oct 1, 2012 4:38 AM

Hold Option while selecting Empty trash.


More info:

http://www.thexlab.com/faqs/trash.html#Anchor-Force-11481

8 replies

Sep 9, 2014 5:21 AM in response to japamac

What does holding option exactly do? It worked for me also though but now need to understand why? I checked the get info and the lock box wasn't checked but i did encrypt the drive and files before I did a backup. I was trying to delete files from my time machine so just the back up file was left. I kept receiving the message some files are locked do you want to remove the unlocked one or all of them?

How do I delete locked items in my trash

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