Disposing of Computers and Hard Disks!

[jayuk]

Well! The story goes, that yesterday morning at work I deleted my outlook PST file which I used to move my older archived emails to as I have a limit at work for 50MB of emails!...I deleted it by mistake and whats worse is that I dont have admin access to my laptop as its work and tightly controlled!

Anyway, spent last nite looking for non-commercial software which basically scans all hard drives and partitions for ALL data that was both securely and non-securely deleted! AND would install without admin rights on the Laptop......

So left it to scan over night!....and its amazing what you find!....In fact shocking! I have contracts, CV's, shoping lists, bank details the works!! of 4 employees that have used this laptop since!!...

Funny old game!!

Moral : Never throw away your Harddrives! as you never know who will get them and do what with them!!

Jay

[GarethB]

Where I work, all the hard discs get drilled to render the inoperable and then they go for incineration!

The paper shredding mavchine is the latest one cuts verticly and horizontally to make the bits of paper supposedly so small the parts can not be scanned and software used to reassemble documents.

[Amarpal]

Scary thought!

[John Smith]

Indeed.

Especially don't throw your drive away if you live in Essex.

Essex County Council's approved method of recycling involves sending the machines to Nigeria to be dismantled. The data can then easily be sold on the drive for a few pounds... and then your personal details are there for any Nigerian scam artist to find.

And unfortunately, Nigeria has more than it's fair share of scam artists .