[gentoo-user] Re: Securely deletion of an HDD

[gentoo-user] Re: Securely deletion of an HDD

[Grant Edwards]

On 2015-07-12, Marc Joliet <marcec@gmx.de> wrote:

> With regards to the other replies: I think physical destruction is
> unnecessary, and I don't really want to go through the trouble.

If it's "trouble" rather than "fun", then you're doing it wrong. :)

There's thermite:

  http://hackaday.com/2008/09/16/how-to-thermite-based-hard-drive-anti-forensic-destruction/

And mechanical shredding:

  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AZdZGKyu9hc

Others favor a high-powered rifle or an 8lb sledge.

-- 
Grant Edwards               grant.b.edwards        Yow! Sometime in 1993
                                  at               NANCY SINATRA will lead a
                              gmail.com            BLOODLESS COUP on GUAM!!

Re: [gentoo-user] Re: Securely deletion of an HDD

[Marc Joliet]

[-- Attachment #1: Type: text/plain, Size: 1066 bytes --]

Am Mon, 13 Jul 2015 15:03:10 +0000 (UTC)
schrieb Grant Edwards <grant.b.edwards@gmail.com>:

> On 2015-07-12, Marc Joliet <marcec@gmx.de> wrote:
> 
> > With regards to the other replies: I think physical destruction is
> > unnecessary, and I don't really want to go through the trouble.
> 
> If it's "trouble" rather than "fun", then you're doing it wrong. :)

OK, you have a point ;-) .

> There's thermite:
> 
>   http://hackaday.com/2008/09/16/how-to-thermite-based-hard-drive-anti-forensic-destruction/
> 
> And mechanical shredding:
> 
>   http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AZdZGKyu9hc
> 
> Others favor a high-powered rifle or an 8lb sledge.

That does look fun!  However, I meant along the lines of destroying the disk
surface, because I want to give the HDDs away for recycling (a computer chain I
occasionally buy from collects old hardware for this purpose).  Good for the
environment and all that :-) .

-- 
Marc Joliet
--
"People who think they know everything really annoy those of us who know we
don't" - Bjarne Stroustrup

[-- Attachment #2: Digitale Signatur von OpenPGP --]
[-- Type: application/pgp-signature, Size: 819 bytes --]

Re: [gentoo-user] Re: Securely deletion of an HDD

[wireless]

On 07/13/2015 10:10 AM, Grant Edwards wrote:

>> With regards to the other replies: I think physical destruction is
>> unnecessary, and I don't really want to go through the trouble.
> If it's "trouble" rather than "fun", then you're doing it wrong. :)

Brilliant statement::

> Others favor a high-powered rifle or an 8lb sledge.


In my impetuous youth, The first time I got to work under an old
AT&T unix license, we had several heated debates with nerds from DC
and Jersey..... turns out I was right; you could kill an "phone switch"
with a single shot (and old at&t 3Bx series).

I took out a .338 with a questionable round and one shot turned off
3 out of 4 drives and most of the processors. The a_holes went back
to their  agency; and I lost some very valuable potential clients.
But Grant is most correct!; if it ain't fun why fork with it?

I did become great friends with some folks from the jersey labs......

cheers!
James

[gentoo-user] Re: Securely deletion of an HDD

[Grant Edwards]

On 2015-07-15, wireless@tampabay.rr.com <wireless@tampabay.rr.com> wrote:

> In my impetuous youth, The first time I got to work under an old
> AT&T unix license, we had several heated debates with nerds from DC
> and Jersey..... turns out I was right; you could kill an "phone switch"
> with a single shot (and old at&t 3Bx series).

Back in the 80s I worked for a company that made/sold radio-telephony
mobile and base station equipment (which is basically a PBX connected
to a bank of radio transceivers instead of phone sets).  They had more
than a few systems installed in various Central and South American
countries during the 60s and 70s (the worse the standard copper
infrastructure, the more important mobile phones tended to be).

The field service guys told me that a not uncommon failure mode for
the base station equipment was bullet holes.

It turns out that one of the first things you do during a coup in a
small central/south american county is take over or disable the
radio-telphone base stations.  [Back then the base stations were much
higher power and covered much larger areas than a cellular base
station does these days.]

-- 
Grant Edwards               grant.b.edwards        Yow! Is something VIOLENT
                                  at               going to happen to a
                              gmail.com            GARBAGE CAN?

[gentoo-user] Re: Securely deletion of an HDD

[James]

Grant Edwards <grant.b.edwards <at> gmail.com> writes:


> It turns out that one of the first things you do during a coup in a
> small central/south american county is take over or disable the
> radio-telphone base stations.  [Back then the base stations were much
> higher power and covered much larger areas than a cellular base
> station does these days.]


Yep:: Then when I got my first research lab, guess what was our first
'Big Donation' ?   A semi trailer full of every make of those old at&t
unix systems; from 3B2's own up the ladder to working switchgear.
We wiped them clean and put Mt. Xinu unix (BSD) on them just to tick
off the at&t folks....  Funny thing was they just kept giving us more and
more equipment...


Kids now a days do not get to play with the 'toys' we did in college.
At poker flats [1] we got to shoot off rockets into the ionosphere. Try
that one today.... The father of the modern rocket [2] taught my son
Multi-Variable Calculus.... Small world when you get down to it....

Want to see the latest in Mach 7 guns?




cheers!
James

[1] http://www.pfrr.alaska.edu/

[2]
http://motherboard.vice.com/blog/lebanons-forgotten-space-race-in-1961-manoug-manougian-aimed-the-middle-east-at-the-stars