clear index.dat files manually in windows xp

dat Files Windows 2000 Professional or a Windows XP Professional machine during eachFollow the instructions below to create the. IndexDat.cmd file. Save the edited IndexDat.cmd file to your hard drive at theUse your arrowIt's OK to delete the Index.dat files asOpen Notepad and type the following: DelUnzip it, right click the file and choose Edit from the menu to edit the file. In this example, the username is Administrator. Replace Administrator with yourDo not confuse All Users, Default User, LocalService or NetworkService as being users.Your file should now be named IndexDat.cmd. It should not be named IndexDat.cmd.txt. Copy the IndexDat.cmd file to the following folder: C:\Winnt\System32\GroupPolicy\Machine\Scripts\ShutdownSo IndexDat.cmd should now be in the Shutdown folder. Shutdown. Click the Add button and browse to the IndexDat.cmd file in the Shutdown folder. Highlight the file, click Open and OK twice. Every time you shut your computer down, it will wipe out the index.datAll rights reserved.June 19, 2014. You'll be surprised by whatAfter downloading it into a temporary directory,It's a single executable file you can place anywhere.You'll get a list of all the files it's found.You can print or save this informationUseful if your index.dat files have been collected and placed in a certain folder.If you don't have that you can send me the old version (but please ZIP it up first).This seems to be a changeIf you disable Windows Themes the program works normally. ItIf you have older versions of IE (that is version 4.0 or less)I don't have access to older browsers but if someone could provide me withMicrosoft have not documented theHopefully index.dat will be deleted. A new one should appear almost immediatelyAs you walk through the Wizard, create theHowever, the file is not really deleted. Even after deleting your cookies and cache, cleaning your history, index.dat files still contain records of your online and some local activities.

• clear files manually in windows xp, clear files manually in windows xp windows 10, clear files manually in windows xp download, clear files manually in windows xp windows 7, clear files manually in windows xp free.

According to Microsoft, these files On Windows Vista and Windows 7 Internet Explorer, it will not delete index.dat files. Using Tracks Eraser to delete index.dat files Eraser deletes Index.dat file Tracks Eraser Pro. UserData records and other information about your PC activities. If the information is too big to fit in theIn fact, in most cases it is impossible to delete Index.dat files manuallyIf you want to know moreIndex.dat files.Windows Explorer. There is a little text file called desktop.ini in each directory where index.dat fileInternet cache or history instead. However youThe location of index.dat files depends on the version of Windows:NT or Windows 95 then index.dat files are in these locations: C:\Windows\UserData\index.dat If you don't have Profiles directory in you Windows directory don't worry - this just means thatIt is also possible that you don't have UserData subdirectories. To learn more about UserData records click here. Their content can be seen onlyWe will examine an index.dat file from the Temporary Internet Files (Internet Explorer cache). First, let's take a look to the index.dat file header:The first thing is the version of the index.dat file ( Client UrlCache MMF Ver 4.7 ) - thisThese subfoldersOn your PC theseThey are just hash indexes of the contentsThey have fairly similar layout. Look at this sample URL record. First, there is encoded date and time. The date andNext, there is Obviously allIf you clean the Internet cache (Temporary Internet Files) thenObviously Microsoft developers are not without a sense ofInternet Explorer and Windows all the time. If you are using an ancient Windows Me, Windows 98 or Windows 95However if you are using Windows 7, Vista, XP, 2000 or NT this won't work. Additional benefit is the ability to preserve the tracks fromMil Shield also cleans all other tracks as cookies, history,All rights reserved. Remove Index.

If you are in Windows, even with “Show hidden files and folders” enabled, index.dat files are not visible and cannot be found. These files are invisible because they have been designated as system files. System files and folders are treated differently in DOS and Windows.Moreover, it makes it almost impossible to permanently erase PC history. In essence Microsoft has made has a very slippery critter that will hide from your attempts to erase PC history. Number one: you should think about switching to the Firefox or Google Chrome which are both browsers that do not contains such technology. Number two: use advanced techniques to erase PC history and index.dat files. This will perform a disk sanitation. This technology encrypts and delete your history. This method permanently eliminates all history from ever being recovered from your hard disk. Even the FBI cant get to it. You may have to register before you can post: click the register link above to proceed. To start viewing messages, select the forum that you want to visit from the selection below. Every URL, and every Web page is listed there. Not only that but allObviously this cannot be the case because when youSystem files and folders are treated differently in DOS and. Although some of their functions are useful, they are dangerous privacy threat - any person with even little knowledge about index.dat files locations and structure can see history of almost all of your computer activities. Index.dat files are not the only privacy threat but they are the most obscure and dangerous one because they are hard to find and even harder to delete. In fact, in most cases it is impossible to delete Index.dat files manually because Internet Explorer and Windows use them all the time. Where are located Index.dat files? Location of index.dat files depends on the version of Windows and whether or not you are using user profiles. Regardless of Windows version in many cases you can't see or find index.

Some are hidden even though After reading this article, you should become These include web pages, websites, local files, image files, PDF files, etc. The time frame of storing these information spans from the very first web page or file opened by. IE to the most recent one visited or opened. The first time when I scanned my index.dat files, I This check was conducted after I run the Removing IE History by usingIt will only remove the History but not the content of index.dat fileBy using cookie, the websitesBased on what stored in your cookie, the site can For example, display what type of ads for you.You can easily delete its contentAn empty index.dat under Temporary Internet Files directory is 32 KB.The only way to remove them is during Windows reboot in DOS mode. Once they are used by IE, Windows places a hold on the file to prevent it from getting removed. (Note: It is possible to log in using Administrator account and remove index.dat of other users). If done correctly, you will be presented with a black screen containing options.Once they are used by IE, Windows places a hold on the files The good news is that you can use freeware Index.dat Suite to remove the contents of all or selected index.dat files without having to boot into DOS.Do you manage your username and password wisely? Software and hardware names mentioned on this site are Should any right be infringed, it is totally unintentional. Internet Privacy groups have long been protesting against Microsoft Index.dat file. These files are hidden on your computer and contains all information from the Web sites that you have ever visited. Every URL, and every Web page is listed there. You will need to manually rid your computer of these files to ensure that you to erase PC history.Open or “locked” files cannot be deleted in any way when the process using them is running. Also, when this files grow as large as 100MB, it degrades your web performance.

Our travel guide includes Singapore Travel Guide, Bali Guide, Bali Maps, UK Destinations, KL Travel Guide, Malaysia Guide, Johor Guide, Hong Kong Guide and is widely used by travelers and backpackers, expats and tourists around the world including Canada, South America, Europeans and Australians. For a better experience, please enable JavaScript in your browser before proceeding. It may not display this or other websites correctly. You should upgrade or use an alternative browser. Does anybody know if it is OK to erase unused disk space in safe mode, would this erase index.dat files. Depending upon which version of Windows you use, some are operating-system protected, and some aren't. Just your luck, some of those that are protected contain sensitive information about your activities. Since you're specifically asking about running the erase task at startup, I'd suggest making a Windows script file (essentially, a DOS batch file) and putting a link to it in your startup folder. Just create a new Scheduled task point it at the index.dat and set it to wipe every Reboot. You'll need to create a task for each index.dat that you want to wipe In the Command prompt it outputs Access is denied or something similar about files I consider to be very important to erase in order to cover tracks. METHOD THAT I USE: I restart my computer with exp.cmd enabled to delete some index's. After this I run index.dat suite and create a.bat file to delete index's that it can delete, and reboot.In the Command prompt it outputs Access is denied or something similar about files I consider to be very important to erase in order to cover tracks.I may be wrong (because I haven't used Index.Dat suite very long) but when you get the command prompt type dialog box saying access denied IDS is trying to delete the index.dat without replacing it first, so it copys the index.dat not the data and then deletes the index.dat and replaces it with the copy it just made.

dat file using Windows Explorer. There is a little file called desktop.ini in each directory where index.dat file is located. This desktop.ini file forces Windows Explorer to hide index.dat files and to show the contents of Internet cache or history instead. However you can use some other file utility and binary (hex) editor to find the files and read their content. Their content can be seen only with binary (hex) editor. We will examine an index.dat file from the Internet cache(Temporary Internet Files). Actually the index.dat header is much larger but this is the most important part of it. The first thing is the version of the index.dat file (Client UrlCache MMF Ver 4.7) - this particular file is from Internet Explorer version 4 but the index.dat file format is very similar in Internet Explorer 5.x and 6. How to erase or clean Index.dat files? Erasing or cleaning of the index.dat files is not an easy task because they are opened by Internet Explorer and Windows all the time. If you are using Windows Me, Windows 98 or Windows 95 you can restart in DOS mode and then you can delete index.dat files one by one (look in the folders that are mentioned above). However if you are using Windows XP, Windows 2000 or Windows NT this won't work. Mil Shield is a powerful privacy protection program that was designed specifically to clean and shred the index.dat files content. Unlike the other methods of dealing with index.dat file content, shredding is the best because it doesn't destroy the entire structure of the index.dat file which can cause Internet Explorer or Windows to crash but instead cleans and shreds only the privacy threatening URL, LEAK and REDR records. Mil Shield also cleans all other tracks as cookies, history, cache, AutoComplete records, UserData records, history of recently used folders and documents and many other.

If you select it in Explorer and hit the delete button you will get an error message that it’s being used. In other words, on your hard drive, there are plain text files called index.dat, they contains links to every web resource you have ever visited and you are not able to erase this file. Perhaps no further explanation is needed of why these files are a privacy threat? 3. Index.dat files location These files are located under each user profile in three different locations. The files are locked by the system and can’t be erased directly. The idea is to create a boot disk, start the computer with the boot disk, and remove the files from the MS-DOS prompt. Our product will also clean up many other privacy threats in your system. In Windows 7 and earlier, Internet Explorer 9 and earlier, used the index.dat file to index all this information, including the Internet Cache, Cookies and History. Every URL and every Web page is listed there was indexed. Not only that, but all of the emails that had been sent or received through Outlook or Outlook Express also gets logged in these index.dat files. These files were to be found therefore in the Internet Cache, Cookies and History folders. The indexing functions are being implemented within a Microsoft database system. The WebCacheV01.dat file in the C:\Users\username\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows\WebCache folder in IE10 in Windows 8 is said to be playing a similar role. While you may be able to see index.dat files in some locations, you will also be able to see counters.dat file, container.dat file, suggestedsites.dat file and so on, in the Temporary Internet Files folder, History, and the Cookies folder. These too, are hidden files. I found most of them to be 0 size files on my Windows 8 computer. It promises to be quite a revealing experience! You cannot delete it or resize it using built-in options. Even if you clear the Internet Explorer History by clicking the Clear History button, the size of the Index.

dat file will not change. Nor will changing the Days to keep pages in history value to 0 change its size. You will have to delete it. You can instead use a good cleaner like freeware CCleaner to remove the file. After to you delete or erase the index.dat file, Internet Explorer will create a new empty index.dat file on reboot. Check these links. Today, web browsing is expected to be nearly indistinguishable from the applications running on our own machines. Web cache is one way that the browser makers shave some time off how long it takes to download information. Cache speeds things along by reusing web page components like images, saving users from having to download objects more than once. Microsoft’s browser, Internet Explorer, refers to web cache as Temporary Internet Files (TIF). In Microsoft Internet Explorer, TIF is organized into subfolders bearing random eight-character names. They are organized using a collection of INDEX.DAT files. Each file in TIF has a corresponding date and time value associated with it. This includes a “last-checked” time, which is used by the browser to determine if a newer version exists on the server. If so, then it will download the newer version. Users can view their TIF anytime using Windows Explorer. Inside the TIF folder, users will see a listing of its contents. Each item in the list will display an icon showing file type, file name, and the associated URL. It’s important to understand that, in this instance, what the user sees is a virtualized representation of the content. The actual items are kept in the TIF subdirectories. The only file that is actually kept here is the INDEX.DAT that keeps tabs on where the files are located inside the various subdirectories. Webmail evidence can also be found in TIF. Hotmail, AOL, and Yahoo. These items can be recognized by the file names. Much of what’s in web cache will be thumbnails (those small images) along with bits and pieces of web pages.

I like Eraser because it is 5x as fast as East-Tec Eraser 2006. 8) So you have options. Try them and see what works best for you. Also I am using XP Pro which might have something to do with the index's not being deleted. I have to log on before the batch file runs. Any explanation is appreciated!! Also I am using XP Pro which might have something to do with the index's not being deleted. Any explanation is appreciated!!IDS does this via batch file. I have it set to search in all Hard Drives (I have 2 HDs) 1. Click run 2.Put a check mark next to tht index.dat I want deleted( all the check boxes are marked by default,except one. The one for PCHEALTH, if you did the set-up (the set-up is a one time thing) it should be all in red. This one is unchecked, the reason is AFAIK 1.The one inPCHEATH doesn't regenerate, the other ones do regenerate.2. It seems to mirror all the other index.dats(when you delete all the other index.dats the one in PCHEATH will be emty) 3., click generate batch file(That black and blue thing-its the 2 squaire from the Left). Then follow screenprompts and restart your computer.The computer should start loading. By continuing to use this site, you are consenting to our use of cookies. However, you can use software such as Privacy Mantra, CCleaner or Index.dat Suite to remove index.dat files from your computer. These files will be recreated when using Internet Explorer, so make sure to remove them regularly. Privacy Mantra 1 Go to CNET.com and download the Privacy Mantra Setup. 2 Click “Open” and follow all instructions to install Privacy Mantra. 3 Click “Start,” “All Programs” and “Privacy Mantra” to open Privacy Mantra. 4 Check the “Deletion of index.dat” option under the Internet Explorer section. 5 Close Privacy Mantra and restart your computer. All index.dat files on your computer will be deleted after restarting your computer. CCleaner 1 Go to Piriform.com and download the CCleaner Setup.

Since 2006, he has worked as a level designer and programmer for various video game companies. Meer holds a Bachelor of Science in game and simulation programming from DeVry University, California. This is called the cache or Temporary Internet Files. Every time a cache entry is saved, it will also insert a pointer to the cache files in the index.dat file. Internet Explorer uses Index.dat files to keep track of offline data (the cache) like an index in the end of the book. a. History index.dat files This is actually a collection of index.dat files. These are history indices, every time you visit a homepage, that address will be inserted into to history index.dat files. Each history index.dat file is associated with a date. In the browser, this is what the history shows. b. Cache index.dat file Internet Explorer uses the cache for two reasons. The primary reason is for fast access to web pages. If the web page you visit hasn’t changed since the last time you visited, Internet Explorer will load the homepage from the hard drive (the cache) instead of the web. To find the cached homepage on the hard drive, it searches in the index.dat file and the browser shows the local page. The cache will also allow users to access homepages offline. c. Cookies index.dat file Every time a web site creates a cookie on your machine, IE will insert an entry in the cookies index.dat file that associates the homepage with the cookie file. Next time you visit that homepage, IE finds the cookie file through the index.dat file. 2. Why are index.dat files a privacy threat? Index.dat files contain url’s to every web site you have visited since the installation of your Operating System. It also contains links to every picture and other Internet resource you have accessed. Index.dat files are in plain text and can be read by anyone capable of opening a file in Notepad. But this is not enough, index.dat file can’t be removed manually easily.

Image size can affect a case, particularly those involving child pornography. If the suspect images are composed entirely of small, cache-like images, then some prosecutors may be reluctant to file charges. The issue then becomes intent. Those images could have been downloaded automatically, without his consent. Images of such a small size can make for a much weaker case. Larger images—those not commonly found as part of a web page—are harder to explain away. View chapter Purchase book Read full chapter URL: Counterspy: Are You Being Watched? Ted Fair,. Technical Editor, in Cyber Spying, 2005 Erasing Cookies and Internet Files As mentioned in Chapters 6 and 7, histories, cookies, and caches can be erased using almost the same steps. In the “ Temporary Internet files ” section you can click on the Delete Cookies and Delete Files buttons. Likewise, in the “History” section you can click on the Clear History button. To keep your Web surfing private, be sure to always clear this evidence from your browser. NOTE In Chapter 5, we discussed the “super hidden” directory found in C:\Documents and Settings\User Name\Local Settings\Temporary Internet Files\Content. IE5. In addition to being well hidden, this folder contains cached Web pages and images from Internet Explorer, and it is not automatically cleared out when you clear Internet Explorer's cache. Therefore, if you are clearing out the cache, do not forget to manually browse there (you have to enter the path in the address bar) and delete all of the files. View chapter Purchase book Read full chapter URL: Spying on the PC Ted Fair. Technical Editor, in Cyber Spying, 2005 Internet Explorer First, we examine how to view and increase the cache of Internet Explorer. If you scroll to the far right, you will find information on when the image was last accessed, which can be particularly informative. Increasing the Cache As you can see, information collected from the cache can be interesting.

Unfortunately, the one drawback with caches is that they are limited in size. You can actually increase your likelihood of collecting additional information of value by increasing the cache. When using Internet Explorer as the browser, you can increase the cache by following steps similar to the previous example. View chapter Purchase book Read full chapter URL: Internet Connection Security Derrick Rountree, in Windows 2012 Server Network Security, 2013 Delete If you click the Delete button on the Internet Options General tab, the Delete Browsing History window appears, as seen in Figure 5.16. Here you can manually delete different types of browsing information stored on your system. Figure 5.16. Delete Browsing History Window The options are as follows. Preserve Favorites website data: Selecting this option will preserve website data associated with the websites listed in your favorites. ? Temporary Internet files and website files: Selecting this option will cause all the webpages and files that have been copied to your system to be deleted. ? Cookies and website data: Selecting this option will cause all the cookies, files, or databases that have been stored on your system to be removed. Although cookies are stored with temporary Internet files, you can delete the two separately. This is because you may want to delete outdated files, but keep your cookies, so that your website preferences and settings are maintained. ? History: Selecting this option will cause the history list kept by Internet Explorer to be cleared out. ? Download History: Selecting this option will clear out the list of files you have downloaded. ? Form data: Selecting this option will clear out data that has been saved regarding forms you have submitted online. ? Passwords: Selecting this option will delete stored passwords you have saved for various web forms. ?

ActiveX Filtering and Tracking Protection data: Selecting this option will delete the list of websites you have excluded from filtering. It will also delete any stored data used by the Tracking Protection feature. View chapter Purchase book Read full chapter URL: Protecting your reputation John Sammons, Michael Cross, in The Basics of Cyber Safety, 2017 Automatically clearing private data If you never want to leave a trace of what you did online, then you probably don’t want to have to manually remove your history, temporary Internet files, and other private data. Instead, it makes more sense for the information to be removed each time you close the browser. In Internet Explorer 11 this is configured by doing the following: 1. After opening IE, click on the gear-shaped Tools icon in the upper right-hand corner, and then click Internet Options. 2. On the General tab, in the Browsing history section, click the Delete browsing history on exit checkbox so it appears checked. 3. Click OK. Firefox also allows you to have Internet information removed automatically. To configure this: 1. Click on the Tools menu, and then click Options. 2. When the Options dialog box appears, click on the Privacy icon. 3. In the History section, click on the dropdown menu and select Never remember history. 4. Click OK. As we saw in Chapter 2, Before connecting to the Internet, you can set Chrome to remove cookies when you close the browser, but there aren’t settings to remove everything. If you want such information saved on the browser, then you should look into using a private browser window. View chapter Purchase book Read full chapter URL: Internet Artifacts Cory Altheide, Harlan Carvey, in Digital Forensics with Open Source Tools, 2011 Internet Explorer Microsoft ships its operating systems with the Internet Explorer (IE) Web browser as part of the base installation. IE has two primary areas where data of primary interest to forensic analysts are stored: in the index.

dat “database” used by the Web browser and in the browser cache. Perhaps one of the most well-known open source tools for parsing index.dat files is pasco from FoundStone (pasco can be downloaded from ). Note that Pasco has not been updated since 2004, but it is still widely used in many forensic live CD distributions. Joachim Metz has developed an updated library based on further reverse engineering of the MSIECF format, which is available at. The libmsiecf library contains two programs. Msiecfinfo displays basic information about parsed MSIECF files, and msiecfexport, extracts the entries contained within the MSIECF files. When a user browses the Web using IE, artifacts are created (index.dat entries added, files written to the cache, etc.) to the appropriate locations, in that user's context. Many times malware will make use of the same APIs in order to communicate and exfiltrate data off of an infected system. Often, malware is running with System level privileges, and as such, an analyst would expect to find entries in index.dat files for the “Default User” or “LocalService” accounts. Favorites IE Favorites can also contain information that may be interesting or essential to a forensic analyst. “Favorites” are the IE version of bookmarks, providing an indication of a user's movements across the Internet. A user's favorites can be found (on Windows XP) in the “C:\Documents and Settings\user\Favorites” directory. The user's Favorites appear in the Internet Explorer version 8 browser as illustrated in Figure 7.1. Figure 7.1. User's IE 8 Favorites. When a user profile is created (i.e., the account is created and the user logs in for the first time), the profiles Favorite's folder is populated with certain defaults. As seen in Figure 7.1, the user has chosen to add the Google.com Web site as a Favorite site. These Favorites appear as URL shortcut files (filename.url); the Google URL shortcut contains the following text.

Users can create folders in order to organize their Favorites into common groups or simply add Favorites to the default folder. In addition to the content of the Favorites file, an analyst may find value in the file MAC times, which will illustrate when the file was created and when the file was last accessed or modified. Depending on the type of examination being performed, this information may prove to be valuable. Cookies Internet Explorer cookies can be found in Documents and Settings\%username%\Cookies on Windows XP systems and in Users\%username%\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Windows\Cookies on Vista and Windows 7 systems. Because Internet Explorer stores user cookies as discrete, plain text files per issuing host, these can be inspected directly. The open source tool galleta was developed for this task. On XP systems, these files are located in Documents and Settings\%username%\Local Settings\ Temporary Internet Files \Content.IE5. On Vista and Windows 7 systems they can be found in Users\%username%\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows\Temporary Internet Files\Content.IE5. Files cached locally are stored in one of four randomly named subdirectories. The MSIE Cache File located in this directory has all the information needed to map any files of interest located in the cache subdirectories with the URL the file was retrieved from. With luck, you can train your users to do them even before calling you or opening a ticket on the problem. This would save everyone a lot of time and trouble. 28.4.1.1 Exit the application Have the user exit the application and then log back into it. There is a very good chance this will solve the problem. 28.4.1.2 Close all other applications It never hurts to ask the user to close any other programs that are open. It may not help, but it certainly can’t hurt and it’s easy enough to do. 28.4.1.3 Clear their Internet browser cache Every time a web site is brought up in a browser information is written to the browser’s cache area.