Swap File Sweeping
When working the Windows system uses a so-called swap file to temporary store the contents of the system memory. All the data that are used in work are located in the memory and thus all the data can appear in this swap file, and you can even be unaware of it.
Imagine that you are editing a document with the Word application. The document itself can be stored on a protected disk. When opened this document is always read to the memory. If Windows just kept the document in memory and wrote it back to disk when finishing work, there would be no problem since when the computer is turned off its memory is fully cleaned and the contents of the document remains solely on the protected disk. However, when a document is opened the memory area containing it can be temporarily written to the swap file. If during the further work this part of the swap file is not overwritten with other data, after the computer is turned off part of your sensitive data from that document remains in the swap file and can be easily extracted from there.
StrongDisk Pro system takes special precautions to prevent such sensitive information as passwords and encryption keys from getting to the swap file.
The problem of information leaks through the swap file can be completely solved by turning the use of swap file off in the system settings, but this slows the system down significantly.
To prevent information leaks from a swap file without turning it off you should check the “Clear pagefile at Windows Shutdown” checkbox on the “Security” tab of the "Options" dialog.
Windows 95 system (not the Windows 98/ME/NT/2000) clears the size of the swap file before switching to MS-DOS mode thus making it impossible to sweep it. To prevent the size of the swap file from being cleared set a fixed size of the swap file in the system settings.
To set a fixed size of the swap file:
- Click "Start" in the Windows taskbar.
- Select "Control Panel" in the "Settings" sub-menu.
- Double-click the "System" icon in the "Control Panel".
- Switch to the "Performance" tab of the dialog to open and click "Virtual memory".
- Switch the radio button in the dialog to appear to the "Let me specify my own virtual memory settings" position and set the same (necessarily) values for the minimum and maximum size of the swap file. We recommend setting this value equal to double the amount of RAM in the computer.
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