How to Securely Empty Trash on Mac
Emptying the trash on your Mac might sound like a simple task but, unfortunately, software issues are not to be underestimated. Many Mac users have been complaining because they can't empty the trash on Mac for unknown reasons. While others are looking for a way to securely empty trash on Mac. You might be wondering what the purpose of the latter action is. The answer is simple – by securely emptying the trash, the user can prevent data from being recovered. Typically, users rely on this to dispose of sensitive data, especially if it was stored temporarily on a system.
Securely Empty Trash on Mac El Capitan and Below
If you are a Windows user, then you might not have come across the ability to securely empty trash. Thankfully, this feature is available on Mac or, at least it used to be available on versions older than El Capitan – the feature was removed in this version. Back then you could right-click the Trash Bin icon and select the Secure Empty Trash icon. This would remove the files from the trash, but it would then perform an extra task – the empty space left behind would be rewritten by zeros and ones and then erased again. This renders data recovery software useless when trying to recover data from this particular section of the disk.
Securely Deleting Files on Newer Mac Versions
If you are using a more contemporary version of macOS, then you might still be able to erase the trash securely. However, it requires a few extra steps, as well as working with the macOS Terminal. If you are not tech-savvy, then we advise you to be careful with these steps – it is easy to mess up and delete data that you did not want to remove. Inexperienced Mac users should handle the task through 3rd-party tools.
In this step, we will not be emptying the trash, technically. Instead, we will be deleting files directly, rendering them impossible to recover. We will start by making a small tweak to your macOS settings:
- Go to System Preferences -> Keyboard.Select Services and then tick the option New Terminal at Folder.
- Apply the changes and leave.
Now, head to the folder storing the files you want to delete it. Open it, right-click on an empty space and select Services -> New Terminal at Folder. Then, use the command rm –P <FILENAME>. For example, if you want to remove document.xlsx, the command would be rm –P document.xlsx. Be careful when using this command because the file will be deleted permanently.
