This wasn't a personal attack on you - I was just making a statement, as I think a few people here do read other people's data on machines that they get.

Then I really feel sorry for those who feel it's easier to trash a computer (where the data is still highly vulnerable) than to simply delete their files, and/or format the hard disk. I do find it somewhat hard to believe that this is the case, in such a technologically-advanced society where these practices are common knowledge.

/end rant.

Click to expand...

Unfortunately, a lot of the time when you get these machines, you're dealing with the general public, whose only knowledge of a computer is, "I put electricity in, and I get Microsoft Word/Internet/Email out of it". A lot of people simply don't know about deleting files, or formatting the hard disk. They also don't know that the hard drive can be completely removed and destroyed on its own, therefore making it impossible to extract any more data from the system. Unfortunately some of them also don't want to learn (and yes, I have tried to explain all this to these sorts of people), and sadly there's nothing we can do about that.