Windows · Secure Deletion
Deleting a file
doesn't delete the data.
Emptying the Recycle Bin removes a record in the filesystem. The contents stay on the disk, byte for byte, until something happens to overwrite them — and recovering them takes free software and no expertise.
VaultSort for Windows is in beta. Free to try, no account required.
What actually survives a Windows delete
The file contents remain
NTFS marks the record unused and the clusters free. It never touches your data — which is exactly why deleting is instant. On a lightly used drive the contents can remain readable for months.
Alternate data streams are usually missed entirely
An NTFS file can carry extra named streams that Explorer does not show and does not count in the file size. A shredder that overwrites only the stream you can see reports success and leaves the rest on disk. This has no macOS equivalent, and it is the detail most often skipped when a Mac tool is ported.
Overwriting an SSD does not work the way it looks
Flash controllers spread writes across the device and keep spare capacity your operating system cannot address. Overwriting a file usually writes elsewhere and leaves the original cells intact until garbage collection reaches them, so a 35-pass shred is mostly 35 times the wear.
Shadow copies keep their own copy
System Restore and File History snapshot files as they were. A document deleted today can sit in last week’s snapshot, untouched by anything done to the original.
What VaultSort does about it
Every stream, not just the visible one
Alternate data streams are enumerated and overwritten alongside the default stream, so the parts Explorer never showed you go too.
The method follows the hardware
Pass counts are matched to the drive rather than applied uniformly, because the right answer on a hard disk is the wrong answer on flash.
Free-space shredding
Overwrites unallocated space so files deleted long before VaultSort was installed cannot be recovered from what was left behind. Run to completion on a 62 GB volume.
TRIM on demand
Tells an SSD controller which blocks are free so it can erase them. Windows-only — macOS exposes no equivalent an application can invoke, so this is one of the few things the Windows build does that the Mac build cannot.
Whole-disk erase, with honest timing
For retiring a drive entirely. A three-pass erase of a 62 GB device took three and a half hours on real hardware, and the progress report says so before you start rather than after.
Refusals instead of half-measures
When an operation cannot reach something — a locked file, a protected directory, a volume layout that cannot be erased safely — VaultSort says so. A tool that overstates what it did is worse than no tool, because you stop being careful.
What it does not do yet
- — Erasing a single volume on a multi-partition removable drive is refused up front, because it cannot be done safely. The whole-disk alternative is offered instead.
- — The drive Windows is currently running from cannot be erased by anything, VaultSort included. Use Windows’ own Reset with data cleaning, or erase it from another machine.
- — Clearing Volume Shadow Copies is a separate, deliberate step. No file-deletion tool can do it for you.
Questions people ask
Is one overwrite pass enough?
On any drive manufactured this century, yes. The multi-pass advice everyone repeats comes from a 1996 paper about encoding schemes that no longer exist, and its own author has said it no longer applies. Use more passes when a standard you are held to requires them, not out of habit.
Does this work on an external drive or USB stick?
Yes — per-file deletion, free-space overwriting and whole-drive erase all work on removable media. Whole-drive erase is the right choice before a drive leaves your possession.
What happens if a file is locked?
It is reported, not silently skipped and not counted as deleted. Locked files are routine on Windows rather than exceptional, so the distinction matters more here than on a Mac.
Try it on your own files
One purchase, no subscription. $24.99 once, and every feature is included.