Hard Drive Destruction: A Critical Component of Any Business

Recycling

You recognize the importance of destroying sensitive data – you’ve paid for paper shredding for years. If your company data were to get into the wrong hands, the cost could be impossible to recoup and your company’s reputation could be irreparable. That’s why data breach insurance coverage always considers the hefty cost of rebuilding public trust.

Put another way, your electronic information is protected by industry-specific privacy laws. Medical information, for example, is protected by HIPAA. So why would you leave the hardware that stores this sensitive information unprotected? How is your organization managing your old hard drives? Hard drive destruction is a secure way to destroy end-of-life assets, protect sensitive data, and preserve the integrity and financial stability of your organization.

Methods of destruction

At Tech Dump, we offer two primary methods of data destruction: physical destruction via shredding and electronic wiping.

Hard Drive Shredding

  • Shredding: Hard drives store data on metal disks known as platters. These platters store data in billions of different, infinitesimally small sections that can be magnetized and demagnetized. One way to ensure that data is effectively destroyed is by thoroughly destroying the platter. Much like a paper shredder, a shearer uses great force to cut a hard drive into many tiny pieces, destroying it beyond repair.
  • Wiping: Wiping data describes the process of overwriting data in order to make the original data unreadable. Data can be overwritten a single time or multiple times, depending on industry standards.

On-site vs. off-site shredding

At Tech Dump, we shred hard drives both on-site and off-site through our mobile shredding service. We recognize that different industries have different requirements and we customize data destruction to meet your specific needs. You can drop your equipment off at our St. Paul facility, we can pick it up and bring it back to our facility, or we can bring our hard drive shredding equipment to your place of business.

Chain of custody

To assure that our clients’ data remains secure throughout our onsite shredding process, we follow a chain of custody. In order words, we count and label your assets onsite and transport them in our private truck. We utilize over 70 high-definition security cameras outside and inside our facility and our employees can only enter our facility through a process that requires pre-authorization.

Recycling

We believe in being good stewards of the environment. Before hard drives are shredded, we carefully sort metals and recycle what we are able to in order to reduce waste and keep toxins out of landfills.

Certificate of Destruction and Certificate of Sanitization

Once your hard drive is destroyed, you receive a Certificate of Destruction and a Certificate of Sanitization. They state that your assets were thoroughly destroyed and the data can no longer be retrieved. We provide these certificates to any customer who requests and pays for them, recognizing that our customers in the healthcare, finance and legal sectors are often required to provide serial numbers for documentation.

Do you have old hard drives stored away? Don’t let them pile up and pose a security risk for your organization. An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure. If you’re interested in our hard drive shredding services, give us a call at 763-432-3117.

Want to learn more about developing an effective, secure and profitable ITAD disposition program for your business? Download our free guide here!

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