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brumgrunt · 26th Apr 2012, 12:11

The Information Commissioner's Office has published a report warning of the risks in selling second-hand hardware.

http://www.bit-tech.net/news/bits/20...s-data-leaks/1

PingCrosby · 26th Apr 2012, 12:21

Bloody ne'er-do-well's

Pookie · 26th Apr 2012, 13:56

I always dismantle a customers (faulty) drive and smash the platters to be sure there is no chance of it being recovered.

Dewi · 26th Apr 2012, 14:03

It does seem ironic that the one time I was ever asked by a family member to retrieve deleted data, the computer had actually managed to wipe it permanently!

In my first year of Uni, I was housed in halls with a block of Computer Science students and one of the things they used to demonstrate was retrieving data from damaged or wiped hard disk drives. Since then I've always insisted on removing the drives from any old computers family and friends are disposing of.

In the end, what we used to do at Uni was actually remove the hard disk platters and use them as coasters on our desks. Over time the heat from mugs of coffees warped the data and rendered it unreadable...

...at least that was the theory!

BlackRaven · 26th Apr 2012, 14:23

I used to use a heavy crowbar to smash the hell out of the drives we used. Done the same on with my own old ones.

Fizzban · 26th Apr 2012, 14:52

There was a thing on Bang Goes The Theory about this quite recently. Showing some of the more..physical ways of erasing data, or not, depending on what they tried. Didn't tell me anything I didn't already know, but it was interesting none the less.

It's still up on bbc iplayer if anyone is interested. Here.

Hustler · 26th Apr 2012, 14:53

Dban was great...until Hard Drives got so big, now even with the fastest (which is the least secure) wipe, it can take soooooooooo long to wipe Hdrives that are TB's in size.

..Choose the most secure method, and your talking literally days to wipe a disc.

yougotkicked · 26th Apr 2012, 18:59

And that kiddies is why you never sell an old hard drive, they are rarely worth enough to justify it. if it still works, add it to a backup array, if it's broken, why are you selling it?

Though those not tech-savvy enough to know how to properly wipe a hard drive are at risk.

Fizzban · 26th Apr 2012, 19:28

Quote:

Originally Posted by yougotkicked

And that kiddies is why you never sell an old hard drive, they are rarely worth enough to justify it. if it still works, add it to a backup array, if it's broken, why are you selling it?

Though those not tech-savvy enough to know how to properly wipe a hard drive are at risk.

Thing that gets me is hard drives cost MORE in Africa if they have data on them! Shocking. Get a good wipe program guys and turn those informations into zeros...or ones..w/e. Just wipe that ****. More user friendly than grabbing your local blow-torch and melting that baby.

OdDBaLL_MoD · 26th Apr 2012, 21:53

Quote:

Originally Posted by Fizzban

Thing that gets me is hard drives cost MORE in Africa if they have data on them! Shocking. Get a good wipe program guys and turn those informations into zeros...or ones..w/e. Just wipe that ****. More user friendly than grabbing your local blow-torch and melting that baby.

Maybe more user friendly, but not as user fun! With proper PPE ofc... :P

Omnituens · 27th Apr 2012, 08:40

In the words of Jamie Hyneman; When in doubt, C4.

Gareth Halfacree · 27th Apr 2012, 08:48

Quote:

Originally Posted by Omnituens

In the words of Jamie Hyneman; When in doubt, C4.

Thermite: s'cheaper, doesn't go 'bang' and have SO19 knocking on your door, and is *very* pretty when it burns. It's also incredibly easy to make.

NOTE: Don't make it. It's fun, it's easy, but it's quite likely to result in a visit from the anti-terrorism squad - and while that sort of thing used to get you a slap on the wrist, these days the manufacturing of an "improvised explosive device" (what used to be known as "home-made fireworks") will likely get you a one-way ticket to Gitmo. Also, thermite is pretty vicious stuff - which is great for wrecking hard drives, but not so great for keeping fingers, toes and eyesight intact.

Omnituens · 27th Apr 2012, 08:58

TBH, if I'm retiring a drive, hammer and nail does the job pretty well. No melty or boom, but a lot safer and much more legal.

bleeper · 27th Apr 2012, 08:59

I always zero my drives, do a deep scan just in case, then securely delete if it found anything (it never does.)

The kind of people with the tools to get past a zero write and actually be able to do something with the information are not likely to be buying up drives off eBay for their nefarious purpose, so I am pretty confident I've nothing to worry about.

That said, at least most people at least attempt to delete the data.

I bought a PS3 hard drive that was clearly someone's porn storage device and even worse a Samsung Galaxy that spent a large amount of it's life producing amateur porn! I swiftly deleted it all after watching it.

MrJay · 27th Apr 2012, 14:16

Quote:

Originally Posted by bleeper

Samsung Galaxy that spent a large amount of it's life producing amateur porn! I swiftly deleted it all after watching it.

Made me giggle!

Im currently using a Recuva to rescue some data from a formatted drive.

Takes an age to scan but once its finished its amazing what you can find.

This drive had been re-formatted re-partitioned and a fresh copy of windows and all his app installed.

id say I've found about 85% of the original content!

ArthurB · 28th Apr 2012, 20:09

Quote:

Originally Posted by Hustler

Choose the most secure method, and your talking literally days to wipe a disc.

You only need to overwrite the data on your HDD with zeros to make it unrecoverable.

The hard drives own internal secure erase feature is also a lot quicker than the methods DBAN uses. IIRC, I wiped a 2TB drive in approx. 1 hour using HDDErase.

Harlequin · 28th Apr 2012, 20:23

try googling for the swedish company that can recover data from any drive - they boast recovering data from hard drives that have been driven over by lorries , smashed to pieces and set on fire.

the US government approved method of destroying a data hard drive? dropping into acid till it melts. Overwriting xxx amount of times can still be read with enough effort.

DanaG · 29th Apr 2012, 03:20

I usually use hdparm to erase drives. The only tricky thing: modern BIOSes tend to send the "freeze security state" command before handing control to the OS boot loader. You'll often either have to hotplug the drive (works fine for AHCI), or use a secondary SATA controller that doesn't send the "freeze" command.

Commands to run (using a random drive as an example, and replacing the serial number with "serialnumberhere"):
hdparm -I /dev/disk/by-id/ata-ST9500420AS_serialnumberhere
Capital i, not lowercase L. That will tell you something like this at the bottom:
Security:
Master password revision code = 65534
supported
not enabled
not locked
not frozen
not expired: security count
supported: enhanced erase
102min for SECURITY ERASE UNIT. 102min for ENHANCED SECURITY ERASE UNIT.

Then:
hdparm --security-set-pass SOMEPASSWORDHERE /dev/disk/by-id/ata-ST9500420AS_serialnumberhere
time hdparm --security-erase SOMEPASSWORDHERE /dev/disk/by-id/ata-ST9500420AS_serialnumberhere
You can instead do --security-erase-enhanced, if the drive supports it.

I run it through "time" -- if the thing takes way longer than it states it should, I'd imagine the drive is unhealthy. (One time I saw two different drives drives report a 30-minute erase, with me present, as taking 450 minutes -- likely due to clock changes.)

EDIT: Also, there is an hdparm for Windows, but nowadays Windows sends the "freeze" command to all drives, as well -- even on alternate SATA controllers, I believe. Hence, you need the Linux hdparm.

deadsea · 30th Apr 2012, 00:50

Well, wouldn't it be easier to just encrypt the whole drive and be done with it? Set the key to be as long as possible and just bash away at the keyboard like Shakespeare's monkeys. If anyone's going to throw that much resources at recovering your data, you're screwed either way.

Bakes · 1st May 2012, 21:05

Quote:

Originally Posted by deadsea

Well, wouldn't it be easier to just encrypt the whole drive and be done with it? Set the key to be as long as possible and just bash away at the keyboard like Shakespeare's monkeys. If anyone's going to throw that much resources at recovering your data, you're screwed either way.

If your operating system supports seamless encryption well (like OSX), then encryption is a good idea if you can stomach the performance loss.

26th Apr 2012, 12:11	#1
brumgrunt Administrator bit-tech Staff Join Date: Dec 2011 Posts: 1,009	ICO warns of second-hand data leaks The Information Commissioner's Office has published a report warning of the risks in selling second-hand hardware. http://www.bit-tech.net/news/bits/20...s-data-leaks/1

26th Apr 2012, 13:56	#3
Pookie Need's a Holiday! Join Date: May 2010 Location: Newton Abbot (originally from Wantage) Posts: 439	I always dismantle a customers (faulty) drive and smash the platters to be sure there is no chance of it being recovered. __________________ Fractal R4/ GA-X58A-UD3R / i7 920@3.8Ghz / Corsair H60 (2013 Model) with 2 x Corsair SP120 / Corsair Force GT 120 SSD /Sapphire 6950 (6970 mod) / 12GB (3x4GB)Corsair Dominator 1600mhz with Airflow Kit / AOC i2757fm 27" IPS Monitor http://www.compu-care.co.uk/

26th Apr 2012, 14:03	#4
Dewi Minimodder Join Date: Jan 2011 Location: London Posts: 26	It does seem ironic that the one time I was ever asked by a family member to retrieve deleted data, the computer had actually managed to wipe it permanently! In my first year of Uni, I was housed in halls with a block of Computer Science students and one of the things they used to demonstrate was retrieving data from damaged or wiped hard disk drives. Since then I've always insisted on removing the drives from any old computers family and friends are disposing of. In the end, what we used to do at Uni was actually remove the hard disk platters and use them as coasters on our desks. Over time the heat from mugs of coffees warped the data and rendered it unreadable... ...at least that was the theory! __________________ Asus Maximus V Gene \|Intel Core i5-3570K \| BeQuiet Dark Rock Advanced CPU Cooler \| 8GB (2x4GB) G.Skill RipjawXF3 \| Crucial M4 256GB RAM \| Fractal Design Define R3

26th Apr 2012, 14:52	#6
Fizzban Reformed Grumpy Sod..kinda Join Date: Mar 2010 Location: Standing Here Beside Myself Posts: 2,813	There was a thing on Bang Goes The Theory about this quite recently. Showing some of the more..physical ways of erasing data, or not, depending on what they tried. Didn't tell me anything I didn't already know, but it was interesting none the less. It's still up on bbc iplayer if anyone is interested. Here. __________________ -Banana in disc drive error- To win the battle, is to be prepared to die - Miyamoto Musashi

26th Apr 2012, 18:59	#8
yougotkicked A.K.A. YGKtech Join Date: Jan 2010 Location: Minneapolis, Minnesota. USA Posts: 237	And that kiddies is why you never sell an old hard drive, they are rarely worth enough to justify it. if it still works, add it to a backup array, if it's broken, why are you selling it? Though those not tech-savvy enough to know how to properly wipe a hard drive are at risk. __________________ Corsair Carbide 500R ::::: NINE (!) case fans Intel I5 2500K @ 4.5Ghz ::::: AIR cooled (modified tuniq tower 120) Asus P8Z68-V LX ::::: 16GB 1866 9-9-9-27-1T (1.4v) Samsung low profile 30nm's Gigabyte Radeon HD 6870 1GB ::::: 1TB Samsung Spinpoint F3 128GB Intel SSD :::: 2x WD 1TB drives in RAID 1

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26th Apr 2012, 12:21	#2
PingCrosby Supermodder Join Date: Jan 2010 Location: Sunny Redcar in Cleveland Posts: 326	Bloody ne'er-do-well's

26th Apr 2012, 14:23	#5
BlackRaven Freaking printers! Join Date: Feb 2010 Location: Dublin Posts: 84	I used to use a heavy crowbar to smash the hell out of the drives we used. Done the same on with my own old ones.

26th Apr 2012, 14:53	#7
Hustler Supermodder Join Date: Aug 2005 Location: The Dark Side Posts: 451	Dban was great...until Hard Drives got so big, now even with the fastest (which is the least secure) wipe, it can take soooooooooo long to wipe Hdrives that are TB's in size. ..Choose the most secure method, and your talking literally days to wipe a disc.

27th Apr 2012, 08:40	#11
Omnituens Hypermodder Join Date: Apr 2006 Location: Leamington Spa Posts: 935	In the words of Jamie Hyneman; When in doubt, C4. __________________ Current Rig: i7 D0 4.06GHz, X58 Sabertooth, 12GB RAM, GTX 680, Xonar D2X

27th Apr 2012, 08:58	#13
Omnituens Hypermodder Join Date: Apr 2006 Location: Leamington Spa Posts: 935	TBH, if I'm retiring a drive, hammer and nail does the job pretty well. No melty or boom, but a lot safer and much more legal. __________________ Current Rig: i7 D0 4.06GHz, X58 Sabertooth, 12GB RAM, GTX 680, Xonar D2X

27th Apr 2012, 08:59	#14
bleeper Minimodder Join Date: Apr 2012 Posts: 28	I always zero my drives, do a deep scan just in case, then securely delete if it found anything (it never does.) The kind of people with the tools to get past a zero write and actually be able to do something with the information are not likely to be buying up drives off eBay for their nefarious purpose, so I am pretty confident I've nothing to worry about. That said, at least most people at least attempt to delete the data. I bought a PS3 hard drive that was clearly someone's porn storage device and even worse a Samsung Galaxy that spent a large amount of it's life producing amateur porn! I swiftly deleted it all after watching it.

28th Apr 2012, 20:23	#17
Harlequin I Mod, Therefore I Own Join Date: Jun 2004 Location: Eastbourne ,East Sussex ,UK Posts: 3,006	try googling for the swedish company that can recover data from any drive - they boast recovering data from hard drives that have been driven over by lorries , smashed to pieces and set on fire. the US government approved method of destroying a data hard drive? dropping into acid till it melts. Overwriting xxx amount of times can still be read with enough effort. __________________ i have a 3dfx voodoo5 6000

29th Apr 2012, 03:20	#18
DanaG Minimodder Join Date: Jan 2006 Location: San Luis Obispo, CA, USA Posts: 25	I usually use hdparm to erase drives. The only tricky thing: modern BIOSes tend to send the "freeze security state" command before handing control to the OS boot loader. You'll often either have to hotplug the drive (works fine for AHCI), or use a secondary SATA controller that doesn't send the "freeze" command. Commands to run (using a random drive as an example, and replacing the serial number with "serialnumberhere"): hdparm -I /dev/disk/by-id/ata-ST9500420AS_serialnumberhere Capital i, not lowercase L. That will tell you something like this at the bottom: Security: Master password revision code = 65534 supported not enabled not locked not frozen not expired: security count supported: enhanced erase 102min for SECURITY ERASE UNIT. 102min for ENHANCED SECURITY ERASE UNIT. Then: hdparm --security-set-pass SOMEPASSWORDHERE /dev/disk/by-id/ata-ST9500420AS_serialnumberhere time hdparm --security-erase SOMEPASSWORDHERE /dev/disk/by-id/ata-ST9500420AS_serialnumberhere You can instead do --security-erase-enhanced, if the drive supports it. I run it through "time" -- if the thing takes way longer than it states it should, I'd imagine the drive is unhealthy. (One time I saw two different drives drives report a 30-minute erase, with me present, as taking 450 minutes -- likely due to clock changes.) EDIT: Also, there is an hdparm for Windows, but nowadays Windows sends the "freeze" command to all drives, as well -- even on alternate SATA controllers, I believe. Hence, you need the Linux hdparm. Last edited by DanaG; 29th Apr 2012 at 03:29.

30th Apr 2012, 00:50	#19
deadsea Multimodder Join Date: Oct 2009 Posts: 197	Well, wouldn't it be easier to just encrypt the whole drive and be done with it? Set the key to be as long as possible and just bash away at the keyboard like Shakespeare's monkeys. If anyone's going to throw that much resources at recovering your data, you're screwed either way.