How Much Are You Worth?

No, I don’t mean, how much are you worth in terms of assets and earnings, but how much are your details worth? There is a story about one million people’s bank details being available on an auction site for only £35. So that makes it 268 people per penny… The story is a little ‘happier’ in that they were found on a second hand computer that was being bought - but it is still scary.

Old computer equipment is worth very little and so companies tend to get rid of them, for basically ‘free’. However, while the equipment may be out of date the data probably isn’t - and with bank details this is especially true. Disposal of equipment is now governed by the WEEE directive - disposal of the data before the equipment isn’t. Companies must put in place proper data disposal policies and procedures to prevent this type of error from happening. Thinking that ‘there is no data stored locally’ is not an option - it often happens as a mistake. How often have you saved work only to not be able to find it - because, through the magic that is computers (I didn’t do anything different - honest), it has been saved somewhere unexpectedly… and that is often to the local hard drive.

So how you you delete the data securely? Depends what it is… if it is really, really classified, then the hard disk needs to be ground up and even incinerated. If less important (and this is probably were most data sits), then deletion is fine - I don’t mean using the inbuilt ‘delete’ function, even a child can recover stuff out of the Recycle Bin, even if it has been emptied. You need to get something that will really delete the information, overwrite it a number of times (33 is the ‘best’!) and then ensure that all meta-data about the file is also deleted. There are a number of free tools out there which do this, I use one called ‘Eraser’ - it works.

Of course, to be completely sure, the whole hard disk needs to be erased - not just where you ‘think’ the data is. So, you do need a process - but it’s simple to do… so make it part of your standard hardware disposal procedure and Information Protection Policy.

August 26, 2008 | Filed Under Information Policy, data-loss 

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One Response to “How Much Are You Worth?”

  1. John Bloodworth on August 28th, 2008

    We all need to rethink the way we use and store data. Today we collect and store data with no regard to it’s usefulness. Instead of finding ways of managing vast amounts of data and containing it losses of sensitive information would be drastically reduced if we stop and take stock of what we store, and get rid of what is not needed (in reality in excess of 60% of data is stored unnecessarily or is orphaned or out of date and as such useless). Only when people and companies understand that not all data is good will we get a hold of what we need, how we use it and how we protect it.

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