How do i restore my secure emptied trash

heey
I was securely emptying my trash folder and i went to look into my iPhoto folder but nothing was there anymore, all my pictures and videos had been deleted. They must have got swipped when i was emptying it but is there any possible way of restoring these files as they were my only copies. Please help
Thankyou

Jasi1311 wrote:
I was securely emptying my trash folder and i went to look into my iPhoto folder but nothing was there anymore, all my pictures and videos had been deleted. They must have got swipped when i was emptying it.
First off, did you actually drag the iPhoto Library to the Trash perhaps with a bunch of other items?
Did you delete pictures/video out of iPhoto itself?
Look inside your Pictures folder and see if the iPhoto Library is there, if it is, then your pictures/video are likely safe, it's perhaps iPhoto needs to be reset.
https://support.apple.com/kb/HT2638
You can also right click on the iPhoto Library and "show package contents" and inside is a folder called Originals containing your original files.
When you Secure Empty Trash, especially with a large amount of pictures and/or video, it will take some time as it's scrubbing the files off the hard drive. Depending how far this process occured depends how many files were pernamently removed from the hard drive.
Because OS X was told "these files don't exist anymore" doesn't mean they are not still on the hard drive, as only their space is made available for new files.
Since you canceled the secure erase, many files could still exist on the drive, just that the remaining ones not scrubbed are soon to be overwritten with new files.
So it's important not to use the computer's boot drive until you can perform data recovery steps.
You can need to install OS X on a external hard drive, then boot from it, install Data Rescue $100 and then have it read the 1's and 0's of the deleted data that remains.
Create a data recovery/undelete external boot drive
You also can take the computer to a local PC/Mac repair shop and ask them to perform Data Rescue, however it's going to cost a pretty penny as they have to sell a hard drive to you and thier time and effort. $200-$300 or so.
If your pictures and video are not worth spending up to $400 for recovery, then your done.
Always have a backup plan in place to "undelete" or boot the computer if it's not operating.
Most commonly used backup methods

Similar Messages

  • How do I switch from "secure empty trash BACK to regular empty

    somewhere I choose to empty my trash securly, NOW I dont want to any more,, Cant find how to go back to NORMAL empting
    Thank you  for this forum

    Finder > preferences > advanced tab.
    Uncheck 'empty trash securely'

  • How can I restore files from empty trash?

    Please someone help me! I deleted my IPHOTO LIBRARY by mistake, and then I pressed " empty trash". Is it even possible for me to recover deleted itens from the trash? I live in Brazil and the closest Apple Store is 5 hours from home. I am not that comfortable with any support companies trying to fix my computer and I can't set up Time Machine alone.
    Any tips?

    I have heard of it, I know nothig about it, Data Rescue is the one I see recommended the most. I had to use Data Rescue once many years ago on a family members machine and recovered quite a bit, but it was a purchased version.
    Try the Wondershare and see if it finds anything (what have you got to lose? as of now you have already lost data) I would try the trial version and see if it recovers anything before thinking about buying the full package.If it does not recover anything then I would not buy it. Maybe then you might try the Data Rescue 3 trial and seee if that recovers anything.
    As for Time Machine back up, you REALLY want to have that on an external drive.You can partition your internal drive for a Time Machine back up, but what happens if the internal drive crashes,? Then you have nothing. With an external Time Machine drive you can replace the broken drive and then restore the data.
    I have 2 back ups 1 Time Machine, and 1 Carbon Copy Clone (the CCC can be booted from, so if my internal drive goes down, I can still start up from the clone. Drives are fairly inexpensive these days, data can be pricless.
    It is not a question of if my drive will crash, it is a question of when, all drives will fail at some point.
    By the way, your english is quite good.
    I hope this helps and you get your photos back, I would be very sad if I lost all of mine.
    Best of luck

  • Trash will only empty securely. How do I turn of secure empty trash?

    Trash will only empty securely.  Have repeatedly turned this off in Finder with no results.  Running Mountain Lion on intel iMac.  Advice much appreciated,
    Geo

    Back up all data. Don't continue unless you're sure you can restore from a backup, even if you're unable to log in.
    This procedure will unlock all your user files (not system files) and reset their ownership and access-control lists to the default. If you've set special values for those attributes on any of your files, they will be reverted. In that case, either stop here, or be prepared to recreate the settings if necessary. Do so only after verifying that those settings didn't cause the problem. If none of this is meaningful to you, you don't need to worry about it.
    Step 1
    If you have more than one user account, and the one in question is not an administrator account, then temporarily promote it to administrator status in the Users & Groups preference pane. To do that, unlock the preference pane using the credentials of an administrator, check the box marked Allow user to administer this computer, then reboot. You can demote the problem account back to standard status when this step has been completed.
    Triple-click the following line to select it. Copy the selected text to the Clipboard (command-C):
    { sudo chflags -R nouchg,nouappnd ~ $TMPDIR.. ; sudo chown -R $UID:staff ~ $_ ; sudo chmod -R u+rwX ~ $_ ; chmod -R -N ~ $_ ; } 2> /dev/null
    Launch the Terminal application in any of the following ways:
    ☞ Enter the first few letters of its name into a Spotlight search. Select it in the results (it should be at the top.)
    ☞ In the Finder, select Go ▹ Utilities from the menu bar, or press the key combination shift-command-U. The application is in the folder that opens.
    ☞ Open LaunchPad. Click Utilities, then Terminal in the icon grid.
    Paste into the Terminal window (command-V). You'll be prompted for your login password, which won't be displayed when you type it. You may get a one-time warning to be careful. If you don’t have a login password, you’ll need to set one before you can run the command. If you see a message that your username "is not in the sudoers file," then you're not logged in as an administrator.
    The command will take a noticeable amount of time to run. Wait for a new line ending in a dollar sign (“$”) to appear, then quit Terminal.
    Step 2 (optional)
    Step 1 should give you usable permissions in your home folder. This step will restore special attributes set by OS X on some user folders to protect them from unintended deletion or renaming. You can skip this step if you don't consider that protection to be necessary, and if everything is working as expected after step 1.
    Boot into Recovery by holding down the key combination command-R at startup. Release the keys when you see a gray screen with a spinning dial.
    When the OS X Utilities screen appears, select
    Utilities ▹ Terminal
    from the menu bar. A Terminal window will open.
    In the Terminal window, type this:
    res
    Press the tab key. The partial command you typed will automatically be completed to this:
    resetpassword
    Press return. A Reset Password window will open. You’re not  going to reset a password.
    Select your boot volume ("Macintosh HD," unless you gave it a different name) if not already selected.
    Select your username from the menu labeled Select the user account if not already selected.
    Under Reset Home Directory Permissions and ACLs, click the Reset button.
    Select
     ▹ Restart
    from the menu bar.

  • Hi guys, an empty folder is stuck in my trash & I get this message: "The Finder can't complete the operation because some data in the folder can't be read or written. (Error code -36). It won't shift no matter how I try to Secure Empty trash. Any ideas?

    Hi guys, an empty folder is stuck in my trash & I get this message: "The Finder can’t complete the operation because some data in the folder can’t be read or written. (Error code -36). It won't shift no matter how I try to Secure Empty trash. Any ideas?

    The Time Machines Backup is formated as Mac OS Extended (Case Sensitive, Journaled), my mac is formated as Mac OS Extended (Journaled).
    The names on the file are all Uppercase
    When I try to copy the Aperture file, it copies about 70% of the file (it's about 33GB in size), and halfway through I get this error.
    I'm able to copy 99.99% of all of the images if I open the Aperture Folder using the "show package contents" under the backups using finder (Time Machine Backups>Backups.backupdb>CQ Macbook Air>2012-04-30-070933>HD.....>Pictures>Aperture Library). The only file I can't copy is that picture, which I'm totally ok with deleting, but Finder won't delete it for me. If nothing else works, I could copy the individual masters and re-create the folders, however I'd hate to do this as I would have to go through 10,000+ pics

  • How do I override "error code -61" when attempting to put things in the Trash? Cannot empty Trash or use Secure Empty Trash.

    How do I override "error code -61" when attempting to put items in the Trash?  Cannot empty Trash or use Secure Empty Trash. I have a MacBook OS X 10.5.8

    The reason why some of the files are blocking the trash from emptying is because of specific ".app" files from third party companies like Adobe products. Not the user files or the various help documents but instead the actual mother program. Here's how to fix this problem:
    1) remove from the trash all the actual software programs like Photoshop, InDesign, DreamWeaver and so on and put them on the desktop.
    2) Command "I" (info) and when the dialog box opens go to the "Name & Extension" text box and remove the ".app" from the software name. Example: Photoshop.app change to Photoshop.
    3) the program icon will change to a "folder icon".
    4) put the folder icon back into the trash and you should be able to now empty the trash.
    If you continue to get the error code 8003 it's because you may still have one or more software programs in the trash that needs to go through this process. Remember - it's not the user files or help documents or supporting files that is causing this but instead the "actual product programs".
    JKai

  • How do I make trash not do a "Secure Empty Trash"?

    Here is what's happening to my Trash whenever I move a file to it for deletion. Ever since I changed the Trash settings to "Secure Empty Trash", and I securely empty the trash when it only have 1 or 2 files in it, it comes up saying there's like 20. when there isn't...so help?
    OR Could someone tell me how to chnage the Trash settings so it is just "Empty Trash".
    Thankayou.

    Uncheck "empty Trash securely" in Finder > Preferences > Advanced tab.
    Regards,
    Captfred

  • Secure empty trash: How many passes?

    When performing a +Secure Empty Trash+ I presume the deleted files are zeroed out, much like when using the +Erase Free Space+ function in the Disk Utility. My question is, if this is indeed the case, how many passes are performed during a +Secure Empty Trash+?

    Way too many. I believe it's seven passes. Don't use it if you are deleting a large number of files because it could literally take days to complete.
    Unless you work for an employer that mandates such security I wouldn't suggest using it. If it needs to be securely erased, then it needs to be encrypted. If it's encrypted then there really isn't a need to use the secure erase option.

  • Secure Empty Trash & Trash Cache

    Am old Mac addict home user with Apple from day one but not a guru. Still have Apple IIE that runs like a clock. With 17 Macs in between, years ago when G3 would slow down, get sluggish and tired, I discovered that setting trash cache and deleting many thousands of cached files would invigorate the machine and restore it's original speed using Preferences in TechTool Pro V 3.
    Currently have TTP V4 in both G5 Pro Mac OS 10.5.6 and G5 Power Mac OS 10.4.11. Cleaning out old manuals got rid of TTP V2 and V3 manuals. Still have CDs but unfortunately no serial numbers. So, unable to open those programs. Micromat archives couldn't help. Also, unable to use TTP V4 preferences to set trash cache as there's no Preferences capability. Apparently it can be assumed there's no trash cache in current versions of TTP.
    Queried Micromat about trash cache who said to "Go into "System Preferences" --> "TechTool Protection". In the "Volume Usage" tab, you can set how many days you want TechTool Pro to save the "Trash History"." No joy as I couldn't figure out what that meant about "System Preferences" or how to do what they recommended.
    No problem as both G5s are operating fine. But, I'm curious.
    I use "Secure Empty Trash" exclusively shutting down my G5s. My questions: Does that shut down feature remove all data from the HD thereby eliminating the need for a trash cache? If there's still a trash cache, is there any way to set it? Thank you and regards. Ol' Jim.

    Did you get a response to this? There is no solution listed, but it’s marked Solved.
    I think you are right that there is no longer a Trash Cache. I did a search and it came up with two files called Trash Cache, both were dated 2002, obviously many systems ago which probably came over with Migration Assistant from previous computers.
    The TechTool Protection is new with TTP 5. You won’t see it in System Preferences with TTP 4. That’s probably why you couldn’t figure out what they meant.
    Secure Empty Trash writes over those files which makes them nearly impossible to recover, so I don’t think you need to worry about them.

  • Secure Empty Trash is only option

    Upgrade to SL went OK but I now find that I only have the option to "Secure Empty" - no longer the option of "Empty". Secure empty takes a heck of a long time for large files. How can I restore the "Empty" option?
    Thanks in advance

    macwiz1220:
    thanks. i just installed snow leopard and couldn't figure out why why i could only "securely empty trash." you saved me a bit of time.

  • Secure Empty Trash not 100% safe

    Recently I use finder to enter directly into Firefox's cache files and move all the files into the Trash. Next I use Secure Empty Trash.
    After that, I used Data Rescue II to see what i can find.
    I am very surprised to find most of the images that i have securely deleted.
    I know the best way is to use Disk Utility's erase free space function, but if Secure Empty Trash is going to write the data 35 times over, and still can't get the job done.
    Then using Erase free space's 35 times write-over isn't completely safe too?

    Normally when a file is deleted insecurely, the data isn't deleted at all - the only thing that is removed is the reference to the data in the file catalogue. Overwriting a file even once (let alone 35 times) should prevent recovery by programmes like the one you mentioned that are designed to detect unlinked files and create new catalogue entries for them. Given the above, a few possibilities come to mind that could account for your observations.
    One is that the files you recovered were not the ones you thought you deleted. For example, working with "TextEdit.app", any time a previously saved document is modified, an invisible "autosave" copy is created on the hard drive, intended to preserve any modifications in case the programme or computer crashes. This copy is removed insecurely once the changes are manually saved. If the original is then securely erased, it will be unrecoverable. However, data recovery programmes can easily recover the remnants of the multiple intermediate "autosave" files. I have no idea how "FireFox" works with cache files, but perhaps what you recovered was remnants from previous times you visited the sites that were cached in the files you securely deleted.
    A second, less likely possibility is that your files were recoverable due to a design flaw introduced in Leopard's version of "Secure Empty Trash" (I haven't tested recently so I don't know if the issue has since been addressed). It is possible to configure it so that files are not securely deleted, even when selecting the option. However, such a configuration would not be a random occurrence - basically, a user would have to set it themselves, although malware or a malicious person with access to your account could do the same...
    A third possibility, perhaps related to the second, is that in Leopard, regardless of whether the over-writing stage of "secure empty trash" succeeds or fails for any reason, the process will still continue to the unlinking stage, in effect deleting insecurely. Prior to Leopard, if over-writing failed, the file would not be unlinked, which had at least two benefits: i) since the file was never insecurely deleted, it would not be necessary to initiate a time consuming "erase free space" procedure to ensure that the data was destroyed; and ii) the very presence of the file serves as feedback to the user that the procedure has failed, unlike in Leopard where it fails silently.
    Either way, using "erase free space" shouldn't be affected by these issues. If the file has been deleted (i.e. copies do not still exist in a hidden cache file somewhere), then overwriting "free space" should prevent basic recovery software from restoring it, assuming the procedure is allowed to run to completion.

  • What exactly does "Secure Empty Trash" do?

    There's very little technical detail on the web about this. I'd like to understand exactly what secure empty trash does.
    What method does it use to overwrite?
    How does it deal with temp files?
    Why does it take so long?
    Why, when there's only one file in the trash, does it always claim it's erasing 9 files?
    What other files is it erasing in addition to the visible trash contents?
    Can it work across network connections and external drives?
    Has the method changed in Leopard?
    etc.. etc..
    Feel free to get all technical, if you know the answers!
    Thanks!

    What method does it use to overwrite?
    It writes over the files with 0's.
    How does it deal with temp files?
    Not sure what you mean. It treats any file in the trash the same. Could you elaborate?
    Why does it take so long?
    Because it has to first write over the item with 0's, then delete the item.
    Why, when there's only one file in the trash, does it always claim it's erasing 9 files?
    What other files is it erasing in addition to the visible trash contents?
    It's a bug.
    Can it work across network connections and external drives?
    Yes.
    Has the method changed in Leopard?
    Not that I know of.

  • Is it possible to change zero options in "Secure empty trash"?

    In the "Secure Empty Trash" feature in Tiger, is it possible to change the settings regarding how many times the file being deleted is zeroed out? Can I choose a 1-pass or a 7-pass, etc?

    I don't think the "Finder" itself offers a way to change the number of overwrites performed during a "secure empty trash". Note that "secure empty trash" just calls '/usr/bin/srm', using the '-m' option -- 7 passes, including zeroes, FF, F6 and random according to the 'man' page.
    Depending on what you are after, and being mindful of the different possible paths for items in the "Trash" in OS X, you might be able to use 'srm' directly, using the options of your choice. Though not recommended, if you get into hacking system files, the options probably can also be changed to some extent from there.

  • Secure Empty Trash seems to repeat itself

    If I use "Secure Empty Trash..." I may (for example) see that 8 files are being deleted and the Trash is now empty. If I then delete 1 file and repeat the aforementioned process I see that once again 8 files are being deleted. Why would this happen? Thanks.

    Hi,
    That doesn't explain some of my own findings - the numbers don't add up.  In my system, if only the startup disk is mounted and a single file is placed in the Trash, a secure-delete progress window will show four items being deleted.
    Just mounting an additional external volume will add two items to the apparent number of items being secure-deleted for each such volume added, even though no files on the additional volumes are placed in the Trash to begin with.
    Here are the tests I did.
    Start with a text file that is on the DeskTop.
    For each test:
    1) duplicate the text file
    2) move the duplicate copy to the Trash
    3) secure-empty the Trash,
    4) repeat step 1
    5) repeat step 2
    6) repeat step 3
    Steps 1-3 were done to be sure the Trash folders were truly empty before performing the actual test in steps 4-6.
    To be determined:
    In step 6, after that single file has been placed in the startup volume's Trash, how many items does the secure-delete progress window show as being deleted?
    Results:
    In my system, if the test is run with no disk volumes other than the startup disk mounted, the secure-delete progress window shows four items being deleted.
    If I run the test after first mounting a single external volume, then the secure-delete progress window shows six items being deleted.  Again, just one file was in the Trash after step 5, the same as for the first test.
    If I mount a second external volume and repeat the test, again with only a single file in the Trash after step 5, the secure-delete progress window now shows 8 items being deleted.
    If I first mount all 15 of my external partitions and run the same test, again with a single file in the Trash after step 5, the secure-delete progress window shows 34 items being deleted!

  • Secure Empty Trash Hung Up

    I selected "Secure Empty Trash" and the process started. It shows only six files to be deleted. However, it has hung up on those six files, now sitting there doing nothing for over an hour. It won't let me cancel the empty command. It won't let me delete anything else while it's running. It won't let me shut down the computer in a normal fashion.
    How can I get out of this?
    Thanks.
    Charley

    No. It's not necessary, since you've solved the problem.
    See these:
    Basic Tutorials on using a Mac,
    Mac 101: Mac Essentials,
    Anatomy of a Mac,
    MacFixIt Tutorials,
    MacTips,
    Quick Assist, and
    Take Control E-books.

Maybe you are looking for

  • How to get version using Acrobat SDK

    I have a plug-in for Adobe Reader and Adobe Acrobat. Depending on the product and version, the plug-in has to perform few functionalities. I am using ASGetConfiguration() to get the product name. Is there any API to get the version of  Reader and Acr

  • Anyone having problems loading hotmail login page in Safari browser?

    Flips back and forth between starting to load one url and another, eventually fails with error messages that say server stopped responding or server not found. Started 2 days ago, well after phone was updated to iOS5 so I don't see a connection. Have

  • IPhoto Photo Streaming says "Sep 2012 Photo Stream" only

    I can't find the full Photo Stream. Also, photos are updating between my iPhone and iPad, but not to iPhoto on my iMac.

  • Auto stretch header, simple but having a hard time

    I'm not sure what I'm doing wrong. I have an embarassingly unfinished site, I usually work in Flash and am a designer so I'm totally a noob at Dreamweaver. Anyway, my problem is that I can't get the header to auto stretch without the whole table frea

  • How do I edit my ID?

    The account I had for iTunes and iCloud is no longer active. I've updated my iTunes can't seem to figure out how to do iCloud.