Ensuring Your Data is Gone: A Guide to Safely Selling Your Samsung Galaxy S20 5G

Are you planning to sell your old Samsung Galaxy S20 5G and want to ensure that all your personal data has been permanently erased? It’s essential to take the right steps to protect your privacy before handing over your device to a new owner. One of the tools you might have come across is called Extirpater, which is designed to wipe data effectively.

Understanding Data Erasure

Before diving into the specifics of how Extirpater works, let’s recap the general process. The first step to secure data removal is to perform a factory reset on your device. This action deletes personal files and restores the phone to its original settings. However, it’s important to note that a standard factory reset does not guarantee that all data is unrecoverable.

Using Extirpater for Enhanced Security

Extirpater provides an additional layer of data security by overwriting the data on your device. The question many users have is: how many times should you run Extirpater after a factory reset to ensure that your information is completely unrecoverable?

While the exact number may vary depending on the specific capabilities of the software, running Extirpater multiple times is generally recommended. This will help to obfuscate any residual data that could potentially be recovered by specialized recovery tools.

Best Practices for Selling Your Device

1. Backup Essential Data: Before starting the erasure process, make sure to back up any important files or photos that you want to keep.

2. Perform a Factory Reset: Go to your phone settings and initiate a factory reset to wipe your data.

3. Utilize Extirpater: After the reset, run Extirpater several times as a fail-safe measure. A good rule of thumb is to overwrite at least three times to significantly reduce the likelihood of data recovery.

4. Physical Inspection: Once you’ve securely erased your data, perform a physical check of the phone before selling to ensure everything is functioning correctly.

5. Remove SIM and MicroSD Cards: Don’t forget to take out your SIM card and any microSD cards before passing the phone on.

By following these steps, you can confidently sell your Samsung Galaxy S20 5G, knowing that your personal information is no longer on the device. If you have any questions or need further assistance, feel free to reach out in the comments!