What does Dell do with returned "crashed" hard drives?

texastacoma   

 

Probably sold as salvage or "as-is" parts.

 

It's your responsibility to make the information on the drive unrecoverable.

 

 

Bev.

 

 

 

 

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Please don't send me questions about your system by DCF Messenger.
Post the issue in the appropriate Board, where they will be answered.

You cannot, you must decide to keep the drive or return it, if you keep it, a hammer is the best way to destroy the data.

Take a big speaker magnet to it. That worked on the old drives.

I am not sure what Dell does but I have checked into what the drive manufacturers do. They do guarrentee that the data that may be on the drives will not get out. If at all possible they do wipe the disks and then remove the platters and destroy them and recycle the main casing only. I would like to think that Dell sends these drives back to the drive manufacturers and this is done. Maybe ChrisM can step in and give us some input as to Dell's policy on this.

Dave

Speaker magnet will not work , it is a myth, well sort of. Some say these new large GB drives cannot be erased with any magnet, the magnet strong enough to erase these drives will bend the platters.

 

"The only magnets powerful enough to scrub data from a drive platter are laboratory degaussers or those used by government agencies to wipe bits off media. "In the real world, people are not losing data from magnets," says Bill Rudock, a tech-support engineer with hard-drive maker Seagate. "In every disk," notes Rudock, "there's one heck of a magnet that swings the head."

http://msn.pcworld.com/msn/article/0,aid,116572,pg,1,00.asp

 

 

 

The real story about data destruction

 

http://www.cs.auckland.ac.nz/~pgut001/pubs/secure_del.html

I know, I love those magnets. I take old drives apart all the time at work to destroy the data and tos the platters in different dumpsters and keep the magnets.

dell returns the drives to the manufacturer - the manufacturer is supposed to wipe the drive. i doubt seriously anyone at seagate or wherever is going through the old drives that come in looking for credit card numbers....

"completely eliminate any data recorded on the returned drives"

 

"Eliminate" does not mean destroyed beyond conventional recovery methods.

 

"Zero fill pattern"

 

zero fill would provide for one of the most recoverable scenerios.

 

"Boot sector rewritten during initial testing"

 

again very easy to recover from.

 

 

If it is sensitive data, crush the drive.

Western Digital's Policy

 

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Seagate, Maxtor & Quantum's Policy

Confidential data and Maxtor's data cleansing process on returned drives.

If you returned a drive with sensitive or confidential information, and have concerns about the data being accessed after being returned, this will explain how the drives data is erased through Maxtor's test process.

Answer

BACKGROUND:

Drives returned to Maxtor from end users may contain sensitive or confidential information. Maxtor recognizes our customers concerns about the security and privacy of any data remaining on a returned drive. Maxtor’s field return test process is designed to protect the customers privacy by completely eliminating any previously recorded data.

PROCESS REQUIREMENTS & GOALS:

The primary requirement is to securely and completely eliminate any data recorded on the returned drives. The process involved in fulfilling this requirement include: Automated test process (No PC based testing) Boot sector rewritten during initial testing, and Zero fill pattern and write verify on all functional returns. Failed drive teardown and rebuild involves automated re-process which also includes Zero fill pattern, and write verify.

SUMMARY:

Maxtor’s field return test and repair process provides automated drives testing that provides no opportunity for personnel to access customer data. During the automated process, functional drives are subjected to a zero fill, which writes a pattern of zero's to all surfaces of the media. This overwrites any previously recorded data, effectively eliminating previously recorded information.