Why You Should Destroy Your Old Hard Drives 

Whether you organically gather data or pay for data collection services, security should be at the forefront of your business objectives. Securing your information can be the most significant difference between converting leads to loyal clients or watching your competitors gain an edge.

Make sure you aren’t sharing your secrets to success or business plans with anyone else. When it’s time to get new hard drives, you can have peace of mind by having professionals securely destroy your older devices and permanently erase data. Investing in hard drive shredding services will ensure that no one can access your company’s private files and sensitive data.

Importance of Data Security

Clients often conduct research and look for trustworthy services when choosing a hard drive destruction business. Securing your data is essential to gaining trust and maintaining credibility in your industry. When you proactively safeguard your data, your reputation remains intact, and clients will feel more comfortable giving you their contact information and payment details to finalize a sale.

On the other hand, security breaches are detrimental to organizational reputations, and will prevent both new and existing clients from conducting business services. As your company needs new hard drives over time, consider securely destroying the old devices to mitigate potential risks as you continue growing your clientele.

Risks of Not Destroying Old Hard Drives

Many companies place their old hard drives and electronics in storage. Even in secure storage facilities, the information on the devices could still be accessed or stolen, which can lead to the following:

• Legal risks: Unauthorized access to data could lead to illegal activities such as identity theft or fraud.
• Security risks: Unauthorized users could gain access to private data such as identities or bank account numbers.
• Financial risks: Data incidents could cause your business to receive safety and compliance violations with related fees.
• Competitive risks: Data breaches could lead to espionage, with competitors accessing your private business plans.
• Reputational risks: Security incidents could weaken your organization or brand’s reputation and lead to monetary loss.

Benefits of Secure Hard Drive Disposal

Hiring professionals to permanently erase data from or destroy hard drives allows you to focus on your daily tasks with peace of mind and keep your operations running smoothly. Shredding or degaussing services ensure the proper steps are taken to mitigate risks and protect your business over time. These solutions allow you to:

Ensure Safety and Compliance

Professional data destruction companies stay up to date with the latest Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) and General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) laws. At the end of a shredding service, you’ll receive a Certificate of Destruction with details about the process. This documentation helps you avoid compliance-related violations with costly fees.

Destroy Data Permanently

Physical destruction of your hard drives ensures no one can recover the data because it uses industrial-strength equipment to shred the devices into thousands of small pieces. This process renders the drive irreparable, offering the most secure option when disposing of electronics.

Safeguard Your Brand

Companies are responsible for following security measures, so data breaches could damage a brand’s reputation. Hard drive destruction services or degaussing solutions offer a way to keep your private data as safe as possible. Keeping information away from the wrong hands allows you to build credibility, trust and loyalty with your customers.

Save Storage Space

Tech upgrades roll out frequently, often calling for new workplace equipment. Storing old computers and electronic devices requires manual labor and takes up valuable space in your office. When you invest in hard drive destruction services and IT asset recycling, you can declutter your workplace or prevent the need to spend money on storage facilities.

Methods of Hard Drive Disposal

Most businesses choose one of two methods for securely disposing of their hard drives — shredding or degaussing. Both services offer effective methods of destroying data, so you have the option of either depending on your brand’s security practices and preferences.

Physical Destruction

A hard drive shredding service offers the ultimate protection for businesses and offices. Uniformed and NAID AAA Certified professionals use state-of-the-art equipment to shred, crush or drill through hard disk drives and solid-state drives (SSDs).

Destroying the small chips inside the device securely disposes of data, making the information unrecoverable. At the end, you’ll receive a Certificate of Destruction to keep for your records.

Degaussing

The degaussing process doesn’t physically destroy hard drives. Instead, professionals expose the devices to extremely powerful magnets. Because information is stored in the drive using a magnetic field, degaussing renders it jumbled and inaccessible within seconds. Afterward, you can recycle the devices.

While degaussing is efficient and affordable, the process doesn’t work for electronic storage devices that aren’t magnetized, such as SSDs or USB drives. The service also doesn’t destroy a hard drive, which may not work well for industries requiring proof of destruction for compliance purposes.

Choosing Your Data Disposal Method

To determine which data disposal method you should select, evaluate the following:

• Devices: What devices do you have? Shredding works on all electronics, while degaussing only works on magnetized devices.
• Environmental impact: What method best helps you meet your environmental goals? Shredding produces waste that professionals must sort before it can be disposed of and recycled. Degaussed devices can be immediately recycled.
• Compliance procedures: Do you need proof of data destruction for compliance? Shredding produces a clear paper trail, while degaussing doesn’t provide documentation.
• Overall service expenses: How much time and money are you willing to spend? Shredding is quick and cost-effective, whereas degaussing requires specialized equipment and is more time-consuming.

Protect Your Privacy With TrueShred Solutions

TrueShred provides secure degaussing and shredding you can trust. As an NAID AAA Certified company with reliable scheduling and consistent service dates, we use the best data destruction practices to leave your information completely inaccessible and irrecoverable.

Our professionals are ready to help you determine the right data destruction method for your media and electronic devices. Explore our comprehensive commercial shredding for other materials, including documents and other media, like CDs and backup tapes. We offer on-site and off-site shredding to suit your needs.

Take the next step to ensure fast, secure destruction of your sensitive data. Contact our team to ask for additional information and receive a free estimate. If you’re a preexisting customer, use our online scheduling form to request an appointment.