Erasing Data off Dead Phones and Hard Drives

[Drago]

I wonder what they were doing with a llama !

I don't know, but im told that whatever it was it isn't legal in most countries.

 

[Archie_tect]

Microwave oven for 5 seconds or so. Data obliterated beyond retrieval.

Nah, you'd need a new microwave after that... in 10 years' time the hardware will have changed so much they won't be able to read it anyway. Remember external zip drives? ...and I've nothing to hide so the CIA, Russia and China won't be interested in lil'ol'me.

 

[Dirk]

Remove the hard drive disc and attack it with an angle grinder, then cut it up using a small disc cutter.
Dispose of each piece of disc in separate locations.

 

[Ming the Merciless]

Overwrite it with tons of porn, then your data is safe

 

[tyred]

Have you run out of grenades?

 

[cougie uk]

CIA use nail guns when they have to leave a country in a hurry.

 

[bitsandbobs]

I wonder what they were doing with a llama !

Making nanobodies

 

[classic33]

Nah, you'd need a new microwave after that... in 10 years' time the hardware will have changed so much they won't be able to read it anyway. Remember external zip drives? ...and I've nothing to hide so the CIA, Russia and China won't be interested in lil'ol'me.

I've two of those, still.

 

[itboffin]

Shotgun job done

 

[classic33]

Have you run out of grenades?

Would that work with a bombproof handset?

 

[twentysix by twentyfive]

 

[Ming the Merciless]

CIA use nail guns when they have to leave a country in a hurry.

They have time to do their nails?

 

[Yellow Fang]

In answer to the question, no a magnet won't work on your phone (solid state drives don't store it magnetically). It might work on an 'old fashioned' hard drive, but I don't know to what degree!

The flap on my work iPhone is magnetic, so I'm glad about that.

 

[Yellow Fang]

My stepmother was worried about an old laptop of my dad's in case it had any porn on it. The laptop would not start up anyway, but I hit it with a sledge hammer and then took it to the dump. He was dead anyway, so I doubt the DPP would have considered it in the public interest to prosecute. There might have been some porn on it, but if it was anything like his dirty mag stash I found in the 80s, nothing to posthumously ruin a reputation.

 

[ColinJ]

No its not dodgy. If i put a strong magnet on either will it erase names addresses bank details ie personal data ?

The important question which nobody has asked: Are you intending to reuse or sell the hardware AFTER data erasure...?

If no, then do as suggested above - physically destroy it.