Physical destruction
Industrial shredders are utilized to dismantle hardware into fragments, rendering it unsuitable for reuse and preventing data recovery. Although the hardware or its components may be recyclable, they cannot be reused in their current state. If the equipment’s materials make shredding impractical, physical crushing or bending may be employed instead.
Degaussing
Degaussing equipment involves subjecting devices to a powerful magnetic field to permanently delete data from hard disk drives and various types of tapes. By passing an electrical charge through a degaussing coil, a magnetic field is created, and additional technologies can be utilized for complete data erasure.
Erasing data
Data erasure involves using software to write random 0s and 1s across storage equipment sectors, effectively eliminating any trace of existing data. This method ensures complete data sanitization at the byte level, although it is a time-consuming process that necessitates a rigorous sanitization procedure for each decommissioned device. Nevertheless, hardware that has undergone data erasure can be repurposed and sold, eliminating the need for disposal in landfills and allowing for additional value to be extracted from it.
Cryptographic erasure
Public-key cryptography with a minimum key size of 128 bits is utilized in cryptographic data erasure to encrypt all data on a device. The private key is then discarded, rendering the data effectively irretrievable. However, this method relies on the device having adequate encryption capabilities to ensure security.
Masking data
Data masking is a commonly employed method that is highly regarded by compliance standards in various regions. It involves generating counterfeit data that maintains the same structure as the original, but with shuffled characters, replaced words, and randomized text. The masked data cannot be deciphered to retrieve the original values, making it an extremely effective technique for sanitization purposes.
To gain further insight into Sureworks’ method of data sanitization and its potential applications for your retired hardware, please contact us for more information.
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