I can't believe I'm being told to pull the board out, come on guys my post count may be low but I know the value of logic boards! Just to say it, I'm OCD when it comes to removing every screw (exceptions being ones that are holding useless plastic pieces together). Meaning I take the boards out by unscrewing, I cringe when I see people just pry them out and the break off. Think of all the times that's been done and pieces weighing a .5gram or so are stuck attached! It adds up! Not to mention the screws need to go anyways to get Clean Al price on the carcasses (I completely scrap out all drives, magnets, motors, platters, arms, and all - even the little mylars have a bucket).
Thank you guys for the very detailed information. I find it interesting there is no "official standards & procedure" for removal or physical destruction, that it's a matter of Scrapper's Choice on how they do it.
That is what I was unsure of - if there was an actual official procedure, not just a matter of signing a paper saying "I SWEAR that Data is Destroyed". And my 2nd unsurity was if anyone can create and sign such a paper or if you needed something official under your belt to be able to make such assurances.
I guess
e-waste recycling is still a bit more unregulated than I had thought it was, what with the semi-recent batches of laws passed to regulate
metal recycling & scrapping - *cough* really to profit from or prosecute scrappers.
I doubt I'd ever, any time soon that is, reach the level where I need something like DBAN (Thanks for the specifics on this). I'm sure drilling a hole through the platters would be as far as I'll ever need to go. So far, of all my "clients" (individual random persons, no businesses or professional contracts), the few who have actually gone as far to express any slight concern, sarcastic or serious, have been completely satisfied by me swinging a sledge hammer at the intact drives sitting on their drive ways. And their concerns were all along the lines of "Nobodies gonna steal my bank info, right?" A concern I've always (silently, of course) thought was simply stemming from ignorance-based fear. It's like digging through trash for credit card receipts - nobody does that anymore, and even if they did...what could they even achieve from it?
Bit of a run on. TL;DR - Thanks for the reply, the lack of any regulation or official standards in the industry continues to both surprise, and open doors, for me. Now I know I can make tell my clients that I can provide Data Destruction on their computers, an incentive i can offer to persuade them to give me their computers instead of simply trashing them. A bit more persuasive than "it helps the planet, go green, yay planet earth"
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