Re: Hard Drive Destruct System?

From: Moe Trin (ibuprofin_at_painkiller.example.tld)
Date: 11/26/04 

Date: Fri, 26 Nov 2004 16:30:18 -0600

In article <1d54b7e4.0411251822.729ae8cc@posting.google.com>, mike3 wrote:

>Would this make a good mechanism to securely destroy a hard drive?
>
>1. Crash the heads into the platters with the drive at top speed

Modern (since the early 1990s) hard drives have a very hard and smooth
surface on the platters. Crashes do occur in real life, and normally
cause no harm. "Top speed" implies the disk powered up and running
normally (heads NOT parked). How do you propose to cause the 50+Gs to
crash the heads while in this condition? Hard drives have gotten a lot
more resilient since Reynold Johnson's "baloney slicer" system in 1956.

>2. Seek them from one edge of the platters to the other back and forth
>to \
> ensure good grinding

See above. Every time you power down a drive, you "crash" the heads
(admittedly at a slower speed) - how much damage to the heads does that
cause? To the media?

>3. Pump a concentrated hydrogen/oxygen mix into the hard drive platter
>chamber
> while the heads are grinding away.

If you are going to be cracking the case (airflow through the vent is
meant to equalize pressures, not cause an air exchange), why not open
it up the rest of the way, and yank the platters so that you can put
them directly in a fire and melt them.

>Would the heat from the grinding be enough to ignite the H2/O2 mix and
>ensure that data can't be recovered?

No. Not enough energy in the H2/O2 that would remain in a typical hard
disk without exploding and blowing open the case. Such an explosion
might damage the drive to make it unusable, but wouldn't damage the media
enough to preclude data recovery.

>Would this mechanism be good enough to keep copies of a large company's
>trade secrets from a competing large company?

No.

1. Go find a recent copy of a hardware book such as Scott Mueller's
"Upgrading and Repairing PCs" from Que, Roche's "Hardware Bible", and
learn about hard disk construction.

2. http://www.cs.auckland.ac.nz/~pgut001/pubs/secure_del.html for a
classic paper on removing information from computer disks.

        Old guy

Relevant Pages

  • Re: Fans and Hard Drives
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  • Re: Fans and Hard Drives
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    (microsoft.public.windowsxp.hardware)
  • Re: Fans and Hard Drives
    ... You are referring to a "power failure". ... The heads will still be floating on the air bearing till the ... Newer drives are designed such ... > that the rotational inertia in the platters is used to safely park the ...
    (microsoft.public.windowsxp.general)
  • Re: Hard Drive Destruct System?
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