How Can Hard Disk Data Destruction Secure Your Privacy?


If you thought permanently deleting confidential files can be done with simple commands like emptying a trash will make it unrecoverable, think again. Because, what you have been missing can cause danger to your privacy.
Such a simple task is not a way you can make confidential information because if it does, identity theft would not be the fastest growing crime today because most crimes were caused by selling formatted disk or discarding disks with physical defects. Even formatted or discarded drives have caused headaches to identity theft victims because these methods cannot make confidential files unrecoverable too.
Hard disk drive technology
A hard disk drive contains a number of concentric stacks of disk or what is popularly known as disk platters. Each platter has two surfaces, and each has its own read/write head what will allow to read and write data synchronously. The data are stored in concentric circles or also known as tracks. Tracks in the drive when taken together, makes up a cylinder. An individual data block is one sector of a track block. It can be accessible by specifying the cylinder, head, and sector numbers of the block.
The sector is the smallest accessible unit in a hard disk drive. The goal of hard disk data destruction is to make a data unrecoverable from the first sector of the file permanently.
What is data destruction
Data destruction is the way of removing remnant data in a disk by executing methods to get into the remnant data and make it unrecoverable.
Data destruction is a procedure that the US Department of Defense had been implementing for years but only a few have knowledge about it because they underestimate the gravity of what an identity theft can do. Therefore, more and more people are becoming victims of identity theft and companies encounter data breach most of the time.
Risk of selling formatted hard disk drives Selling formatted drives is not a way to sell the disk clean. According to MIT from the hard disk they bought online 90% of the formatted disk have recoverable files that contain personal information, bank account information and some disk were known to came from banks and financial institutions.
Discarding malfunctioning hard disk drives Even damaged disks can have recoverable files in it. Do not just dispose them off as if it were a regular trash because there are tools in which files in a broken disk can get recovered.
Exposing confidential or personal data
There are a lot of risks involved when you allow confidential or personal data to be exposed to the public. One of which is identity theft. Identity theft is the fastest growing crime in America and in just a span of a year the number grows to 9.9 million victims. When a person becomes a victim, and individual can lose more than $4,000 or at least 3 months of the average wage working in full-time. Recovering from identity theft, a victim can spend more than $500, and the repair could last for 30 days or more, not counting emotional recovery. A company, on the other hand, will spend more than $500 per person in the hard disk drive that got an identity compromised.
Securing data privacy
Securing data privacy is a cheap and easy task. The sooner you start the cheaper the data destruction method will be.
Data Encryption
Data encryption converts a plain file into heavily encrypted file using complex mathematical calculations and algorithmic schemes. A file that is encrypted cannot be opened unless the person knows the key code or password.
Advantage
A quick and easy process to hide confidential data. Even if, the file is deleted, the data is still encrypted. Can be controlled remotely (e.g. encrypt files over a network).
Disadvantage
When the passphrase is lost or forgotten, it cannot be recovered anymore. Complex file encryption methods consumes a lot of CPU, not recommended if you use the data most of the time.
Data wiping
Data wiping is a process where the deleted files are overwritten so that it can no longer be recovered. It overrides the file with 0s and 1s and probably some random characters so the data can no longer be read. Data wiping can wipe files selectively or format and wipe the entire contents of the drive. It is the recommended method of DOD before you sell or donate a hard disk.
Advantage
Confidential files can no longer be seen nor recovered. Most wiping software are free and can be downloaded online.
Disadvantage
Improper hard disk wiping procedure can still have files recoverable. Full disk wiping consumes a lot of time. It can take from days to weeks depending on the capacity of the hard disk drive and the speed of the computer's processor.
Physical Hard Disk Destruction
This method destroys the hard disk drive so it will no longer be in its working state. You can use any kind of house tools to destroy a hard disk drive or send it to hard disk destruction companies. Make sure when destroying the disk yourself, that the platters receive all the damage because this is where all your files are.
Advantage
No visual verification required because once the hard disk is deformed, cracked, or burnt you are sure that nobody can recover the file. Fast and effective data destruction procedure.
Disadvantage
Discarding a disk is a pain because of the environmental risk a broken hard disk may cause. Safety concerns when destroying broken drives should be implemented too.
Arnel Colar is a freelance writer that writes anything that can provide knowledge to the readers around the world. He writes articles ranging from environment preservation, social education, finance and loans, money, and anything that he can think of. With good research, convincing details, and creative insights added with passion, articles can become a masterpiece.


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