Data Protection

One of the greatest concerns faced by our customers when disposing of their redundant IT equipment is the removal of personal and/or sensitive data contained within them. Not only are there obvious ramifications of sensitive company data falling into the wrong hands, but companies can and have been prosecuted under the recently updated 1998 Data Protection Act.

The 1998 Data Protection Act makes it a legal requirement to adopt appropriate security measures to prevent unauthorised access, alteration or accidental loss or destruction of personal data. Under the 1998 Data Protection Act, failure to remove personal data from a computer's hard drive may result in Crown Court prosecution and unlimited fines, to include personal compensation claims.

For further clarification, we recommend you visit the official government web site at http://www.dataprotection.gov.uk/

The only way to permanently destroy data, without physically destroying the hard disk, is by multiple overwriting of the data by generating and recording random characters across the entire surface of the drive, resulting in all data being destroyed and file sizes reset to zero.

There are an increasing number of overwriting standards which people refer to including the American Military standard DOD 5220.22-M or Infosec Enhanced Standard 5. Basically these standards dictate that the drive has to be overwritten a minimum 3 times.

Secure Disposal use the latest overwriting software that exceeds this standard and allows us to overwrite our customer's hard drives up to a maximum of ninety-nine times. In the event that a hard disc cannot be data erased or if it is below 10GB the drive will be shredded.

All company references including permanent security markings will be removed from equipment, prior to resale. In the event that permanent security markings cannot be removed, equipment will be forwarded for disposal.