Recovered files cannot be securely overwritten.

[northridge]

I deleted files from an encrypted drive whilst the drive was "open". I have recovered them - again with the drive open - and tried to overwrite, but they cannot be overwritten. Is there a way to resolve this?

[Nergal]

I don't understand, you are trying to recover them and then you want to overwrite them? why bother recovering them at all?

[northridge]

Obviously I explained badly - sorry.

I ran Recuva to check for files that had been deleted, not erased, in order to erase them.

I want to erase them but they all say "not overwritten".

 

The files were originally on an encrypted drive. Unfortunately I dont remember whether I deleted them directly from the open encrypted drive or moved them to another location or the recycle bin before deleting.

They show up as recovered files: I want to overwrite them, but cannot.

[northridge]

No help on this?

What do I do when I try to overwrite a file and afterwards it says "Not overwriiten"?

[Augeas]

I want to erase them but they all say "not overwritten".

The common reasons for Recuva not overwriting files are that

 

The file is under 1k and is entirely within the MFT

The file is zero bytes long

The file has been overwritten by another live file

The file has been overwritten by another file which has itself been deleted

 

It would be unusual for these reasons to apply to all of your files. As I have never encrypted a file in my life I have no idea what Recuva does with them.

 

The files were originally on an encrypted drive. Unfortunately I dont remember whether I deleted them directly from the open encrypted drive or moved them to another location or the recycle bin before deleting.

Where are these files? You must know where they are as you are trying to overwrite them. On the encrypted drive? Somewhere else?

 

They show up as recovered files: I want to overwrite them, but cannot.

Recuva does not show any files as 'Recovered' (apart from when files are in the process of being recovered). I am not actually sure what is being attempted here.

[northridge]

Obviously we have a communication problem. I must be more careful with the words I use to describe what I am doing and what I want to do.

 

The files are on an encrypted and password protected part of an HD. As far as I understand the files themselves were not encrypted - just hidden until that part of the HD was "opened" with the password.

After "opening" the encrypted part of the HD and scanning for deleted files I see, using thumbnail view, some images and some "no preview available". The images are clear and identifiable,and have their original filenames. Mousing over them they read "Size - 279Kb (for example) - Status unrecoverable". File sizes range from less than 100kb to nearly 4,000kb.

Selecting Secure Overwrite I get Not Overwritten.

Even though it reads "Status - Unrecoverable" right-clicking gives me the option to Recover: so I recover them to another location, secure overwrite with other files, and delete the randomly-named results.

When I scan the HD again the files are still there.

[Augeas]

I think I see what you are doing now. Unfortunately I don't know why you are getting the Not Overwritten message, and I am not familiar with the interaction between CC and encrypted or password protected files. Perhaps someone who is will respond. Can you remove the password protection temporarily?

 

Have a look at the Info panel in Recuva for these files. Does it say that 'This file is overwritten with etc...'? If so you will not be able to overwrite them for reasons given in my previous post. The only flaw in this is that you should not be able to see the original thumbnail.

 

As Nergal says, recovering and securely deleting files is completely pointless. Recovery is a copy and paste operation, the files will remain in their original position and condition.

[northridge]

Okay, thanks, I too am clearer about this now.

Just FYI, in case you havent come across this before, the actual files were never encrypted - the encryption program creates a "virtual drive" that is opened by a password (and can be hidden from view if the user chooses) - the files themselves are simply locked inside this.

 

So, seeing as I have files that apparently cannot be overwritten, and there are lots, I have another idea, but need clarification.

If I copy the files I want to another drive, will other stuff get copied too - like that dreadful and mysterious "Recycler" whos objective seems purely to make life difficult, deleted files, incomplete files, etc?

For example: I copy or cut/paste folder "A" to another drive: all the "active" files will be copied, but what about everything that was deleted from that folder?

If I can create a "clean" new drive then junking the old one is the quickest and easiest solution.

 

Thank you for your support.

[Augeas]

Copying live files, or folders, will just copy what's live. No deleted files will be copied.

 

Deleted files that aren't overwritten aren't necessarily a problem. In normal use the deleted files on the disk will be eventually overwritten, and if they aren't super-sensitive then why worry whether they are overwritten or not? But perhaps as they were in a password protected part of the disk you may have your reasons. You could copy what you want to keep, format the disk, then run CC's wipe free space. That should clear the lot. Then copy your data back.

[northridge]

Thank you.