Safe & Secure Methods for Destroying Your Hard Drive Data

Hard drives are built to withstand a lot of use, but eventually, they will all have to be retired, replaced, and/or disposed of. However, regardless of whether the used hard drives are due to an equipment upgrade, a computer liquidation, or an entire infrastructure reconfiguration, the fact remains – the sensitive information contained on the drives can be accessed and used for illegitimate purposes if the hard drive disposal is not handled properly and the data is not destroyed in a safe and secure manner.

Unfortunately, many companies do not understand the risks associated with improper data destruction. They think that formatting the hard drive is enough to erase any previously recorded data. Sadly, this is not the case and for those companies that have their data stolen; it is a lesson that can ruin not only their reputations but their bottom lines as well.

Data Sanitization vs. Hard Drive Disposal

It is important to note that just because a company uses a hard drive disposal service; it does not automatically mean that the data contained on those drives will be rendered irretrievable. The only guaranteed way to ensure the data is effectively removed from the drives is to use software data sanitization that provides a detailed and auditable report of the erasure.

Hard drive destruction, on the other hand, renders a hard drive unusable but the data on the platters can still be salvaged by those experienced in the field of data recovery.

Comparing Data and Physical Drive Destruction Methods

There are a number of methods available for data and hard drive destruction, the most common of which include:

• Hard drive crushing
• Hard drive shredding
• Degaussing
• Disk sanitization

Hard Drive Crushing: Hard drive crushing offers a quick, affordable, and easy way to dispose of unwanted hard drives that have no sensitive data recorded on them. This process involves placing the hard drive on to a platform in which a pneumatic blade is then used to crush the disk to the point that it cannot be re-used.

Hard Drive Shredding: Hard drive shredding involves running the hard drives through an industrial-strength shredding machine. The disk is shredded into thousands of tiny particles that in no way can be reassembled.

Degaussing: Degaussing utilizes an extremely powerful magnetic field to warp the hard drive’s platter. The industrial magnet renders the drive inoperable and the data essentially irretrievable.

Disk Sanitization: Disk sanitization uses specialty software that overwrites the existing data on the hard drive several times over. The process completely obscures the data under multiple layers of magnetic flux. In order to comply with DOD 5220.22, a drive needs to be overwritten at least three times prior to disposal or reuse.

While each of these methods offers data destruction in one form or another, only disk sanitization allows for the hard drive to be reused without the threat of the data being recovered. Hard drive crushing, shredding, and degaussing each render the drive unusable, but experienced persons can realistically retrieve the information if disk sanitization is not first applied. For this reason, many companies in need of very strict data destruction security measures choose to undergo both disk sanitization and one of the secondary physical disk destruction methods to ensure complete security.

How to Dispose of Hard Drives Properly

As equally important as how you destroy your data is the manner in which your hard drives are disposed of. The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has very strict guidelines concerning the handling and processing of e-waste and companies that are found to dispose of their e-waste outside of these guidelines can be subjected to severe penalties and fines. The only way to protect your company is to use an e-waste recycler that is ISO-14001 certified and a certified e-Stewards enterprise.

If you are looking or an all-in-one solution for DOD-certified data destruction, drive disposal, and EPA-compliant e-waste recycling then call Liquid Technology today at 800-797-5478. We are an e-Stewards enterprise, ISO-14001 certified, and a member of NAID. We can provide you with affordable and auditable solutions for all of your IT asset management needs, from computer liquidation to on-site or off-site data and disk destruction.