# How do I find deleted history?



## Tarquin (Jan 12, 2006)

Does anyone know how I would go about checking internet history if it has been deleted from view/history menu, recycle bin and also temp files? Is it stored anywhere else on the hard drive?

Any (easy to follow) advice that doesnt involve downloading any software would be greatly appreciated!

Thank you!


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## oshwyn5 (Sep 23, 2005)

Nope, it is stored in one location and when you clear it, it rewrites the index.dat file for the folders when you restart your computer and if you open your browser, the new stuff is stored where the old stuff was thus permanently overwriting it so that it is all gone.

Now if you have a firewall it may have a log of sites visited if it was configured to log such activity.
What firewall do you have? Do you have logging enabled?


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## Tarquin (Jan 12, 2006)

Thanks for the reply Oshwyn! The firewall that I use is ZoneAlarm and I have logging enabled. How do I go about looking at web pages visited? I had a look at the Internet logs (where I believe zonealarm stores logs) and none of it made much sense!


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## Squashman (Apr 14, 2005)

I didn't think the Index.dat file got overwritten when you clear the Internet History. I will have to test that.


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## bigjohnny (Jan 14, 2006)

the index.dat does not get deleted unless you used a program specific for that purpose or closed explorer.exe and deleted it in a command-prompt. The index.dat can be read by some programs designed for that purpose, or if you change users, you can open the other user's in notepad and search for the "http://". Program to try: IEHV - http://www.nirsoft.net/utils/iehv.html . I've been able to view sites visited from years back if the index.dat was never corrupted.


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## Squashman (Apr 14, 2005)

I have the Index.dat suite on my computer which I why I am pretty sure the index.dat file doesn't get cleared when you delete your history. I have the Index.dat Suite clear my index.dat files when the computer boots up.


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