Help Lamesecure May have erased EVERTHING!

[Sweener88]

HELP may have lost everything!
I ws using this program called lamesecure to try and password protect my folders, it wasnt workign properly so i uninstalled it and the"secure folder" it created coudlnt be deleted because it said i diont have the permissions even though im positive i do. also a message on lame secure came up saying i coukldnt open the file it made which is supose to be secure ( i was trying to open it in lameseccure to try and erase the password or file itself) and i clicked release files, now all my doccuments are messed up and itunes keeps saying it cant save the library which i cant even find on my HD. is everything gone? what the heck did this stupid program which is supose to protect my stuff do!? plz help!!

 

[motulist]

Startup from the install cd, open disk utility, verify the disk and repair if needed, then repair permissions. Then startup from your hard disk and cross your fingers.

 

[~Shard~]

it wasnt workign properly so i uninstalled it

How exactly was it not "working properly"? Please elaborate so this can be troubleshoooted better.

the"secure folder" it created coudlnt be deleted because it said i diont have the permissions even though im positive i do.

Well, what are the permissions then when you check them? Did you verify and repair permissions? What happens when you go into Terminal, can you chmod the folder or something to that effect? What happens when you change permissions to what they should be?

also a message on lame secure came up saying i coukldnt open the file it made which is supose to be secure ( i was trying to open it in lameseccure to try and erase the password or file itself) and i clicked release files, now all my doccuments are messed up and itunes keeps saying it cant save the library which i cant even find on my HD. is everything gone? what the heck did this stupid program which is supose to protect my stuff do!? plz help!!

How are your documents messed up? Is your iTunes library gone, or simply unaccessible?

What were you specifically trying to protect in the first place?

 

[Sweener88]

ok i had a folder with a text document with all my passwords and cdkeys, just stuff i canted to save, i doenloaded lame secure to put a passowrd on this folder. when i uses lame disk it created an item on my desktop what looked like an application, its white has pencil ruler paintbrush on it. i tried to open it but it wouldnt let me, so i said to heck with this an uninstalled the prorgram and dragged this new app file to the trash. it wouldnt let me delete it cuz it said i didnt have permisson, so i reinstalled lamesecure and tired to open the folder with it but it said that it was dammaged and gave me the option to cancel or release files. thinking it would just destroy itself and open my text doccumdent i clicked it. now all of my preferences (safari boomarks, pictures, absolulty eveyrthing in my user folder on mac hd including all my music) is gone. i use dthe restore cd to start up and repaired permissions and fix disk (nothing to repair it said) i just started up and have seen that my dock, background, everything is different (back to default) my harddrive says theres only 20gb used (so i geuss that releiese file thing deleted everyhting since i sould have like 70 used). im so upset right now, all my europe pictures and all my music, podcasts etc, are gone. iv only had a mac for like a month and moved to it because i thoughnt it was so much more secure then windows. now all my data is gone. is there anything i can do, i cant belive this stupid program tricked me....im beside my self right now

 

[motulist]

iv only had a mac for like a month and moved to it because i thoughnt it was so much more secure then windows. now all my data is gone.

I understand you're upset, and you have every right to be, but not at the Mac. You installed a piece of software, which is free, which is made and released by an individual and not a real company, which is still beta as seen by its 0.# version number, which you then launched and gave permission to run, which you then used without fully reading the documentation for, even though it is a type of software that could obviously destroy the files you use it on if there is a problem, which you then use without testing it on files you don't care about, and which you then decide to use on almost your entire disk full of irreplaceable data.

No operating system on the planet could have prevented this. The Mac is not a fault. The developer is mostly not at fault. Who's left?

The best advice I can give you is to walk away from the computer for a few hours before you possibly mess things up more by acting in haste. Take a break, relax, get some food, etc. Then come back with a fresh head and see what advice people have given you. Maybe you'll realize you have some back ups or something.

 

[Sweener88]

i know i know i didnt mean mac osx i ment mac in general like the comunity of apps and stuff, i relaize this is 99.9% my fault (the other .01 goign to teh creater of that program that coudlnt aleast put a warching saying, pressing releaswe files actually deletes your years of work) well i geuss theres nothign to do then accept the mac community is just an infected with the SMALL percent of same peopel that plague the windows the jerks of the world that liek recking peoples lives by using virus's and porgrams that delete stuff. In general i LOVE the mac comunnity, you guyz have helped me in all my problems so well and this is my first poroblem iv had so far usign my mac (too bad it had to be this seriosu) iv accepted that EVERYthing important to me on my computer is gone (media, games, applications, widgets...everything gone) now i need to move on (and buy an external HD to backup on). Since i still have those stupid folders on my desktop i cant delete and my whole decktop etc. is screwd up how can i wipe it clean and restart a new life in my mac, basically format it, And, can i do it WITHOUT DELETING my bootcamp windows partition? *sigh* thanks for you help in making this process easier on me

 

[Sweener88]

which you then use without testing it on files you don't care about, and which you then decide to use on almost your entire disk full of irreplaceable data.

Wrong i used it on one text file, when i tried to get rid on that one file and clicked release whioch i thought would do that it deletded everything! i used it on a small file and it did dmagae to everything.

 

[motulist]

I'm telling you man, don't act in haste. There are unerase utilities, you can email the developer and politely ask for his help and he might be able to get your data back. Really, do yourself a favor and step away from the computer for a few hours. All hope might not be lost as long as you keep a cool head. Relax for awhile, go catch a movie. Seriously, that's the best thing you can do for yourself right now.

 

[Sweener88]

lol dont worry im at school now ( i was home on spare when it hapend) and iv tried to contact developer who didnt leave an email adress anywhere in the program info. so basically im screwed. plus i dunno how it voulnd be gone when the mac hd says theres 60 gb of free space which means all of that has be deleted. im not on my computer though so dotn worry, im just trying to research as much as possible here at school so i can get this stuff done tonight

 

[motulist]

iv tried to contact developer who didnt leave an email adress anywhere in the program info

His website http://www.students.niu.edu/~z110241/ says his email address is "extraneous * extraneous * us (replace asterixes for email)" which I think means his email address is extraneous@extraneous.us . I've never used this program, but judging by the rating and reviews at versiontracker http://www.versiontracker.com/dyn/moreinfo/macosx/15042 it seems like most people are very happy with this software.

 

[UKnjb]

There's also more info on the developer, Gorman Christian, at Versiontracker, here, and also his own feedback on Lamesecure (admittedly a previous release to yours):

LameSecure 0.58 (Mac OS X)
I'm done.**
I found this utility useful when I wrote it, and despite popular belief several others have as well. I could not be more blatant about the lack of real security-- it's just a quick trick and I made no attempt, short of out right saying it, to hide that. However, this program has become more trouble then it is worth my time to share with the community. So the link is dead, and until I find time to re-write it more intuitively and include directions on things I thought where obvious not to do it will remain dead.

 

[Sweener88]

thanks im goign to try and contact this guy, if anyone kows and unerase programs liek you mentioned eariler plz post. im trying to research as much as psoiible now that im cooled down

 

[Makosuke]

Data Rescue II. Let it scan your hard drive, and see what it finds. If you haven't done too much with the drive, there's a chance it will be able to recover some or most of your files. You'll know before you pay for it, anyway, since the demo shows you what it can find and lets you grab one file to test.

This is assuming that the files are actually gone, and that this isn't just a permissions issue preventing you from accessing them.

 

[Sweener88]

Dadta rescue 2 found everything!! itsa ll there, too bad i cant afford to buy it (high school student no credit card or 100$ us to spend) sigh damn free program hid it on me and its all there :-(

 

[motulist]

Be very careful, your data is not hidden, it's really erased. Which means the data is there but the file locations are not written into the system's file directory. Meaning, the data will only be there until the system overwrites that portion of the disk during normal usage. In other words, you do not want to do ANYTHING with your computer until you recover that data. Just surfing the web will begin to destroy your data. If you want to recover your data then you have to do it NOW. And by now, I mean RIGHT NOW. Do not do ANYTHING else with your computer until you recover your data. If the recovery software is a download, do NOT download it to the problem computer, use a different computer and burn a cd. It's not my data, so it's no skin off my back, but you've been given a very rare opportunity that most people don't get - the chance to recover the entire contents of your unbacked up disk after a seemingly irreparable problem. You shouldn't be acting so nonchalant if you care about the missing data as much as you say. You've been given a 2nd chance, a rare thing in this world, so grab it before it's gone.

 

[Sweener88]

I really appreciate your concern and ur understanding of the seriousness of the situiation how ever iv just rembers something awesome! my ipod has all my music so i can get it off that (with help of small software) and my europe pictures were recently burned to a friend who went on a trip, all my word documents are backed up on my data key, so basically i just relised im fine (expect for preferences and widgets, minor though) im going to format it now probabily, the thing i want to know is how would i get that data off my computer that is deleted but not really? besides payign $100.00 for software? im just curious incase this ever happens again (even though it wont since today i baought an external harddrive im keeping in a small fire proof safe in my room when not in use)
thanks for you help tho man i really really appreciate it!!!!!

 

[motulist]

I'd just like to point out how prescient I am:

The best advice I can give you is to walk away from the computer for a few hours before you possibly mess things up more by acting in haste. Take a break, relax, get some food, etc. Then come back with a fresh head and see what advice people have given you. Maybe you'll realize you have some back ups or something.

 

[funkychunkz]

If it were me, I would have been turned away by the name of the software (LAMEsecure)... In any case, If you just want to store passwords and strings like that, just use keychain util. or other apps specifically designed for that. An actually SECURE method to password protect a folder is to put it into a pwd protected DMG using disk util (supported by apple, so it SHOULD be secure).