Sorting and Shredding

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ArcticDiver
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Sorting and Shredding

Post by ArcticDiver »

Have you ever sorted your old files and shredded some, hopefully a lot, of them? Just spent the day with my spouse doing just that. Did Not Realize how much was in our files. The first drawer and half generated 2 1/2 large trash bags of shred and paper. Still have the rest of the first filing cabinet to go.

Then, there are the excess computers. We have a surplus Surface Pro 2 and an Dell XPS that have to go once I figure out how to clean the hard drives. Don't know if the solid state drive can even be wiped of personal and sensitive data.

Should have been doing this routinely. But, didn't.

Fair warning. Learn vicariously. Don't repeat my error. Stay current on the filing. #-o
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Cupronickel
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Re: Sorting and Shredding

Post by Cupronickel »

Maybe drill a few holes in the hard drives. When I got rid of my old laptop, I took the hard drives to work and cut them in half with an alligator shear.
A flute without holes is not a flute, a doughnut without a hole is a danish.
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ArcticDiver
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Re: Sorting and Shredding

Post by ArcticDiver »

I don't mind destroying the hard drive in the Dell XPS. The new owner can just pop in a new inexpensive drive. But I am not so sure the same is true for the Surface Pro 2 and it's solid state drive.
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CaptnJack
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Re: Sorting and Shredding

Post by CaptnJack »

We burn our old records in the woodstove. Makes it more fun lol
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Norris
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Re: Sorting and Shredding

Post by Norris »

Well if you do clean the hard drives assure that you use a program that actually overwrites rather than deletes (cleans) files. Deleting actually just allocates that space on your hard drive to be used for something else thus leaving the data which can be recovered. If you write a bunch of zeroes to the HDD this effectively wipes the data.
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RoxnDox
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Re: Sorting and Shredding

Post by RoxnDox »

For the Dell, download Darik's Boot & Nuke. www.dban.org

For the SSD, since DBAN says it won't do SSD's, perhaps turn it on and give it a soak in some saltwater... Ought to make it reasonably unusable!

Jim
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<LCF> "There is ALWAYS another day to dive, as long as you get home today."
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ArcticDiver
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Re: Sorting and Shredding

Post by ArcticDiver »

You folks seem to have no better ideas than me. I can destroy the mechanical hard drive without any difficulty. Replacement is cheap. Or, CCleaner has an overwrite function that will overwrite a lot. Takes awhile. But, so far it works. Probably not worth it for the XPS. I used CCleaner on another computer drive. Two of us tried to get info off it using everything we had, short of magnetic imaging. No Joy.

But the Surface Pro 2 is a good machine. As far as I can discover SSD replacement is not practical. So, destruction is the only alternative. Or, is it? That is the question.
The only box you have to think outside of is the one you build around yourself.
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RoxnDox
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Re: Sorting and Shredding

Post by RoxnDox »

I've used DBAN on a number of computers - wipe them and then reinstall a bare-bones Windows back onto the disk, then I give the machines away. The SSD looks to be a whole different mess, according to https://raywoodcockslatest.wordpress.co ... ure-erase/ You may need to reformat the SSD and hope for the best, if you want to pass that one along.

Jim
<Penopolypants> "I, for one, would welcome our new cowboy octopus overlords."
<LCF> "There is ALWAYS another day to dive, as long as you get home today."
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ArcticDiver
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Re: Sorting and Shredding

Post by ArcticDiver »

Thanks Rox for that reference. It was a good article but a see bit dated in some respects.

Last I looked TrueCrypt is no longer supported. Thaat means any of several changes in hardware, firmware, or software could make encryption incomplete, ineffective, or end up making a drive useless.

I've never been a drive tech. But I've been told the classic low level, data destroying hdd format is no longer available. Last time I made the effort to recycle a hdd I was told the only way to wipe a drive was to overwrite the drive with junk data, mainly 0 & 1 enough times to destroy residual magnetic image. Otherwise, although the data would appear to most reading tool to be erased, it could forensically be recovered.

Mechanical hard drives are so cheap except for recycling within an organization it probably isn't worth the effort. Just destroy the hard disk and replace it.

From all this it seems my choices are to either find another use for the machine, or destroy it.
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RoxnDox
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Re: Sorting and Shredding

Post by RoxnDox »

Yes, the repeated overwrite method is the only acceptly safe way. DBAN meets the current milstd requirements last time I looked, but it is hard to keep current... You have to use alternating patterns of 1s and 0s, and you have to make enough passes over the entire disk that the magnetic remanance - the 'echo' of previous bits at each location on the disk - is reduced so low that the computer forensics cannot read it out and reconstruct the original data.

Jim
<Penopolypants> "I, for one, would welcome our new cowboy octopus overlords."
<LCF> "There is ALWAYS another day to dive, as long as you get home today."
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ArcticDiver
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Re: Sorting and Shredding

Post by ArcticDiver »

Duh...maybe. I just signed on to another machine that has Axcrypt on it. I need to check its' current status. It is a file oriented program. But it may be a possibility.

Too bad there are so many folks, not government, who spend so much effort mining data. Some of that is voyeurism. But much is the basis of actions that do not have people's best interests in mind. I've seen some real disasters from data breaches in medical facilities and insurance files. That doesn't include someone sitting in a hut in another country running salvaged hard drives for content to sell.
The only box you have to think outside of is the one you build around yourself.
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