Disposing of hard drives

Matt Lincoln Russell (Lincoln)

May 7, 2009 10:11 AM ET in News, , ,

In an all-too-frequent security breach, researchers purchased a hard drive on Ebay that contained US military secrets. Included in the data were policies, blueprints, and test-launch procedures. The disk also included personal information about Lockheed employees, including social security numbers.

None of us here on Icrontic are harboring military secrets on our hard drives (well, probably not anyway), but what sort of precautions to do you take when disposing of hard drives at home and at the office? Personally, all my retired hard drives are in a shoebox; their platters will make a nice set of coasters before their cases and logic boards meet the rubbish bin one day. Reselling them on Ebay is definitely not in the cards, even for my mundane data.

17 Comments:

  1. Thrax
    7 May '09, 2:14 pm

    If I never really cared about the data (it wasn't sensitive), I just set DBAN to zero-fill throughout the night and the work day. That'll thwart anyone who isn't specifically prepared with forensic recovery.

    Otherwise I just drill three holes through the hard drive.

  2. Kwitko
    7 May '09, 3:08 pm

    We cut our drives into pieces using a band saw.

  3. QCH
    7 May '09, 3:30 pm

    We escort our drives to a shredder...

  4. MachineDog
    7 May '09, 3:30 pm

    There's little tabs on the sides of hard drives or sometimes on the top that peel off real quick and allow you to stick a small screwdriver inside and snap the platter. The really shitty drives like the IBMs smash into a million pieces easily while the freaking western digitals you have to bend to **** and are difficult to break. We also liked applying a hammer to the top of the drives till hearing the platters smash into pieces.

  5. _k_
    7 May '09, 3:54 pm

    I prefer something like this

  6. MiracleManS
    7 May '09, 4:07 pm

    I've never had to dispose of one, because they've all been stolen

  7. gregb49
    7 May '09, 4:26 pm

    If you've the time, there are people who are grateful for the magnets. A box of my old drives, suitably wiped of course, and dropped on concrete, went to a guy making his own wind turbines.

    One man's junk is another man's treasure

  8. Mt_Goat
    7 May '09, 6:30 pm

    I prefer to take mine to the range and splatter them with at least a .30 caliber.

  9. _k_
    7 May '09, 6:56 pm

    But then you have to pick all the pieces up.

  10. Mt_Goat
    7 May '09, 7:08 pm
    Quoting _k_

    But then you have to pick all the pieces up.

    Actually, with a rifle you get a throuh and through but with a handgun you usually get bits and pieces. A 45 ACP just destroys them to smithereens!

  11. Black Hawk
    7 May '09, 8:20 pm

    As part of my job I've had to take a few HDD's to the recycling plant where they destroy them and I have to take back some scraps and pics. Companies trust couriers way too much.

  12. Cliff_Forster
    7 May '09, 9:07 pm

    When I worked in road MRO sales, one of my government accounts was at the Sparrows Point ship yard where they would retire Navy ships. The military has a specific three part process for destruction of a hard drive, and part one involves taking the platter out, hitting it with a grinding wheel.

    Business on small girding wheels was good.

  13. TurboPenguin
    8 May '09, 1:30 am

    A few years ago my business would keep them under lock and key and after a year of so of collecting I would get some drill bits and punch through 4 1/2" holes then take them to the recycler.... Its amazing what a drill bit does to the platter.... Warped and twisted... It was a good thing to do on fridays when you needed to get out of the office..

  14. Zuntar
    8 May '09, 11:41 am

    Yea, the platters make nice mirrors to see who is walking up behind you!

  15. AlexDeGruven
    8 May '09, 1:43 pm

    The last time we put new drives in the SAN, one of the storage guys brought by the following contraption:

    1 plastic storage bin with a hard-drive shaped/sized hole in the bottom of 1 side, and a 1" diameter hole in the top.
    1 48-inch steel breaker bar
    1 32-oz mini-sledge

    Place hard drive, platter-side first, into hole. Align breaker bar with 'exposed' area of platter. Strike until your aggressions are released.

    The point on the breaker bar makes a neat 1/2" diameter hole in the top casing of the drive so you can see all the shiny glittery bits that are left over from the platters.

  16. revorocks
    9 May '09, 9:29 pm

    IF you have more than one you could do this http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yISqCAnROh8&feature=related

    All I do is give it a few hits with a sledge hammer or just zero the drive.

  17. drasnor
    10 May '09, 5:35 pm
    Quoting TurboPenguin

    A few years ago my business would keep them under lock and key and after a year of so of collecting I would get some drill bits and punch through 4 1/2" holes then take them to the recycler....

    We do almost the same thing except we use a 1/2" cutter and a mill.

    -drasnor

Troll-free since 2003 ®