Wipeout, an electronic information security application from IndiSoft, a Columbia, Maryland-based technology development firm, is now available to the financial services industry in the United States.

The application, which is currently used in the health care industry in India, enables users to permanently remove sensitive data from the hard drives of PCs and laptops. A

designated username and password is required to obtain access.

“We feel strongly that an application like Wipeout will be beneficial for the industry,” said Sanjeev Dahiwadkar, IndiSoft CEO. “In today’s market, financial institutions regard information intelligence and protection of data as their highest priorities. It is imperative to take every precaution to ensure that the information not be compromised.”

Operating systems usually only erase references to deleted files, but disk clusters still maintain the sensitive data, which means confidential information remains exposed to potential threats, IndiSoft points out. Wipeout prevents the theft of valuable information by removing the traces of all information in the deleted files from hard drives and writable storage media.

“So now, each time you delete the file, you can be assured that the file is really deleted-beyond any recovery-and have peace of mind that the information disposition is compliant with the data destruction laws and policies,” Dahiwadkar said.