Been researching the various methods for frying a hard drive beyond forensic recovery. Saw several sites suggesting an acid bath for the platter. If it works it seems quick, with little effort (as opposed to drilling, hammering, etc.). Was wondering if anyone here has tried it? Specifically I'm looking at two products: ARMOUR-Glass Etching Cream Ferric-Chloride-Etchant solution Both sold at various art supply stores, Amazon, and so on. The former for etching glass and latter one for metal. Anyone used these? Anyone like to venture a guess as to if either would destroy a hard drive platter?
Or use DBAN https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Darik's_Boot_and_Nuke Not sure why you want to destroy the platter, but if you have an interesting reason, post it.
I briefly considered it. The PCs I buy are used from eBay, and tend to last about 3-4 years before the hard drive goes into IMF self-destruct mode. I have had this XP Pro computer at least four years now. Too risky for re-use. I am having the computer tech coming by early December to transfer everything over to my 'new' Win7 PC that can be, pull the hard drive, remove the platter, then salvage the mobile rack and DVD burner. Once I have dealt with the platter 1-800-GOT-JUNK will take care of the remains....along with a lot of crapola I have accumulated over the years. I'm officially tired of flirting with the idea of becoming a 'hoarder', so I'm doing some major housecleaning.
According to my posts on various forums, the general consensus is that all the free disk-wiping programs like DBAN take between 5 to 10 hours to complete, depending on the erasure method used. I'm looking for something a lot faster than that, but without the labor of hammer or drill.
According to the websites I checked, burning it releases toxic fumes. Believe it or not, I'm no more interested in buying a gasmask than I am in getting a drill or hammer. Of the ways sites have suggested for destroying a hard drive platter, the acid method is the least labor intensive, cheapest, and requires the least paraphernalia. Some acid (about $10), and a borosilicate crystallizing dish (have it). So I will assume no one here has tried the acid method. Edit: Just found out it looks like nitric acid is required to destroy the data ~ https://www.harddriverecovery.org/hard-drive/repair/destroying-hard-drives-101-the-acid-test/ Too risky for me. Guess I will have to check the Tool Lending Library for drill, bolt cutter, etc.
But it does not require you to control it all the time. It also should scale well provided you have enough PCs/motherboard ports. Wiping all drive may take hours. If you just want to make data irreversibly lost on fully encrypted drive then you may just overwrite headers where keys are stored. Instead of writing terabytes of data it requires megabytes at most.
I am aware of that. The fact is I do not have that many wall outlets, even less 3-prong ones, and all are in use. Something would have to be sacrificed for the 5-10 hours it would take. Yes, I could do it, but looking for another route. In going over the tool-list at the Tool Lending Library, I see some possible options....electric engraver, woodburning pen, soldering iron, and bolt cutters. The problem is I'm unsure just how far forensic recovery has gotten, and to what extent the platter must be destroyed. I'd assume that if drilling a few holes is sufficient, then any of the above would work, but assuming is usually what screws you over in the end.
Find a bridge or cliff and pelt it into the ocean. Sand, salt and rust will eventually make it unusable. Gees, you must really have some secret/s you want kept that way. Personally, I have no problem re-using any HDDs / SSDs for other purposes as I suggested earlier. In any case, I'm done here. Best of luck.
SSDs are not trustworthy for data deletion both SSD and HDD can have manufacturer related stuff (drivers) so they will handle storage differently so you never know, but HDD is considered safer to erase data from, 1 wipe pass is enough, I have read about a virus that can resist 1 pass data wiping, and that you need more passes, I get it you want to get rid of the virus? it is science fiction though, 1 pass is always enough I only speak here because computers interest me in general, all aspects, and there are not many occasions to speak about data ARMOUR-Glass Etching Cream Ferric-Chloride-Etchant solution this is for the HDD drive that you are angry at I hope if this is incriminating stuff, I truly hope its not, than better hand it over to the police as data deletion or destruction is an incriminating hint in general
Tech giants found destroying thousands of data storage devices every year - but why? by Sead Fadilpasic
