Security Basics mailing list archives
Re: Hard Drive data security
From: Kirk Schafer <infosec-capital () rainswept com>
Date: Thu, 14 Oct 2004 12:36:17 -0500
Given the nature of business, sometimes all you have to be is "good enough" to make someone look elsewhere. For media not protected by a metal shell (like a hard drive), a strong magnet will work. A permanent ceramic with sunspot strength can be obtained for about $15. A have one in my office, and a few swipes with one of these and data evaporates. If you're interested in this, I'll refer you to a good supplier.
Darik's Book and Nuke (DBAN) is a hard drive overwriter that can be burned to a bootable CD or floppy. It will boot Linux, and will wipe ALL mass media it finds in a computer. With today's hard drive sizes, plan on it taking all night.
Referral link: http://dban.sourceforge.net/When you consider that usually all that necessary to prevent identity theft is to shred your documents, shredding your drive this way is usually "good enough". Just be better than average, but keep in mind that you can't wipe a disk that won't start up. At this point, someone with enough initiative could recover data you consider too expensive to wipe. A product like Utimaco SafeGuard Easy encrypts your data on disk, and a stolen laptop, or even a failed, unwipable disk would not expose you to capital risk, because the data is always encrypted on the media. Failed drive? Just give it back. No wiping necessary.
Referral link: http://www.utimaco.com Best regards, Kirk Schafer Infosec Capital D. Weiss wrote:
The only real way to destroy the data is either to sand the platters off or melt the whole thing down. Sanding is easier and if you use a nice fine grade sand paper as the last sanding, you can get the disks engraved for IT awards and whatnot. -----Original Message----- From: tony tony [mailto:tonytorri () yahoo com] Sent: Tuesday, October 12, 2004 12:43 AM To: Jonathan Loh; Paul Kurczaba; security-basics () securityfocus com Subject: Re: Hard Drive data security Paul, Try the non-techie approach....after they verify that your hard drive is bad...then take a hammer to the disk...pound on it a few dozen times...then give it to them. Why do they want your bad hard drive anyway? --- Jonathan Loh <kj6loh () yahoo com> wrote:Use eraser, or norton wipe, or some other tool to erase the whole thing. Eraser is a free utility. But note this only works if the company usesjustanother computer to try to recover your data. If they use scanning microscopy well then...... but that's expensive. That's if you can access the drive. If you can't powerful magnets work really well. Just make sure the harddrive is out of the computer when you dothat.--- Paul Kurczaba <paul () myipis com> wrote:Hi, I have a question about hard drive data security. The hard drive onmynotebook is failing and Dell is going to replace it. They are going totakethe old one with them. How can I securely remove the data from the hard drive? Thanks, Paul__________________________________ Do you Yahoo!? Yahoo! Mail - 50x more storage than other providers! http://promotions.yahoo.com/new_mail===== Tony T. CISSP, CISA, CDP, CIA Senior IS Security & Risk Manager 360.906.7893 (Work) Northern Telecom LLP
-- ___________________________________________________ Kirk Schafer Infosec Capital - Your Information Security Asset 308 East Broadway Ave, PO Box 1851 Fairfield, IA 52556 641-919-1783 (mobile) http://www.infosec-capital.com
Current thread:
- Re: Hard Drive data security, (continued)
- Re: Hard Drive data security Atom 'Smasher' (Oct 07)
- Auditing a Win2K box xyberpix (Oct 07)
- Re: Auditing a Win2K box Marco Bellini (Oct 07)
- Re: Auditing a Win2K box Josh Mills (Oct 07)
- RE: Hard Drive data security Paris E. Stone (Oct 06)
- RE: Hard Drive data security Atom 'Smasher' (Oct 07)
- Re: Hard Drive data security Ansgar -59cobalt- Wiechers (Oct 07)
- Re: Hard Drive data security tony tony (Oct 12)
- RE: Hard Drive data security David Gillett (Oct 13)
- RE: Hard Drive data security D. Weiss (Oct 14)
- Re: Hard Drive data security Kirk Schafer (Oct 15)
- Re: Hard Drive data security Ghaith Nasrawi (Oct 15)
- RE: Hard Drive data security ssaehrig (Oct 15)
- Re: Hard Drive data security GuidoZ (Oct 15)
- Re: Hard Drive data security GuidoZ (Oct 15)
- RE: Hard Drive data security Chris Carter (Oct 18)
- Re: Hard Drive data security (slightly OT) Kirk Schafer (Oct 19)
- Re: Hard Drive data security (magnet link) Kirk Schafer (Oct 19)