Just because you’ve deleted an email or program on your computer, even emptying it out of your desktop’s Recycle Bin, doesn’t mean the file is irretrievable. Potentially, hackers could find those tossed-away files, allowing access to your personal information. There are even computer experts that will retrieve a deleted file for you, in cases where you deleted some file you really wish you hadn’t. How is this possible? After all, you deleted the file, didn’t you?

Think of your computer’s memory as a map of the world. Each country is a file or program you have asked the computer to store. The larger countries are programs (Canada, Russia, India, etc.), because programs take up more area in memory than files, and the smaller countries (Puerto Rico, Guam, Rwanda, etc.) are files, such as the essay your son is writing for his history class or the digital picture you have of your sister on the cruise she took last summer. The oceans and other bodies of water are blank areas in your computer’s memory, where you have never stored a file or program.

Every time you make a new file or add a new program to your computer, a new bit of land is carved from the water, creating more space for files and programs and leaving less area of your computer’s memory blank. If you made a new file on the map of the world right now, a new island would magically appear named, well, named whatever the file was named; if you just decided to type up Grandma’s hand-written recipe for buttermilk biscuits, the new island might be named “Grandma’s Biscuits”. The island is likely to appear anywhere on the map, but we’ll put the new island just off the western coast of the United States, near California.

There are three ways you can classify parts of your computer’s storage memory (of which we’ve discussed two): countries are files and programs with names; water is empty memory; areas that have the shape of a state or country, but with no name, are files or programs that have been forgotten, still holding their original information until the area is used for another file. Now, say you delete The state of Florida, as you no longer need that file; you even empty it from the recycle bin. Your computer handles your order to delete a file this way: It simply “forgets” that a file called “Florida” ever existed. It doesn’t make the area in memory that Florida held blank like the oceans are blank, it leaves the state of Florida full of your information, but with no name with which to access that information. Therefore, hackers could still find out about Tallahassee, Key West, and Disney World, if they have enough patience and the appropriate hacking software. It is similar to when you tear up your credit card bill and throw it away; if someone has enough patience to go through your trash and put torn pieces of paper together, then they may discover your account number and other private information that may lead to identity theft (which is why you should use a paper shredder on sensitive physical documents). The information that used to be called Florida will stay there until another file needs to use the exact space that the information no longer called Florida is holding.

So, now our map of the world has two changes. First, there is a small island off California called Grandma’s Biscuits. Also, the state of Florida still has an outline on the map, but with no filename with which to access its stored information. To better organize your computer’s memory, you will need two programs: a disk defragmenter and a disk cleaner. A disk defragmenter will locate all the islands and relocate them to the mainland. Grandma’s Biscuits will now touch California, instead of being out in the Pacific Ocean. Packing files and programs in storage closer together helps the computer locate information faster. A disk defragmenter is similar to you taking all the loose papers spread around your house and organizing them in a file cabinet. A disk cleaner will find all the areas where you deleted a file, yet the information it held persists in the computer’s memory, such as Florida, and truly make those areas blank. If you ever plan to sell, donate, or recycle your computer, delete all your personal files and then run a disk cleaner before any stranger gets possession of the equipment to prevent identity theft. Both types of programs should have come installed on your computer; if not or you want the latest and most advanced version, check with Microsoft for relevant articles (such as one on disk cleaners).