[Gllug] Securely disposing of old hard drives

[Alain Williams]

On Mon, Aug 20, 2007 at 09:39:47AM +0100, Richard Jones wrote:
> I've got a stack of old / obsolete hard drives.  Suggestions as to how
> to get rid of them securely?
> 
> I'm not worried about MI5 / govt agency security, but I would like to
> prevent some casual thief fishing one out of the bin and grepping for
> passwords and bank account details.
> 
> My best idea so far was to dismantle them, but there are quite a lot
> (about 20) so this would be time-consuming ...  Another thought was
> that soaking them in water ought to be enough to damage the
> electronics sufficiently to stop them from just working.

The shred program is a good first step, then hit them hard a few times
with a hammer. That should stop the likes of you & me using them again.

-- 
Alain Williams
Linux Consultant - Mail systems, Web sites, Networking, Programmer, IT Lecturer.
+44 (0) 787 668 0256  http://www.phcomp.co.uk/
Parliament Hill Computers Ltd. Registration Information: http://www.phcomp.co.uk/contact.php
Chairman of UKUUG: http://www.ukuug.org/
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