Types of Hard Drive Shredding - Woodland Hills Document Shredding
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Types of Hard Drive Shredding in Woodland Hills

When you upgrade the computers in your Woodland Hills office, It’s difficult to determine what you should do with the computers you’re replacing. Most companies re-sell them, give them to employees, or donate them to a local church or school in the San Fernando Valley. This is a great way to re-purpose older equipment that might still be useful, but the biggest question we ask is this:

Hard drive degaussing Woodland Hills

Did you take steps to ensure that you didn’t accidentally include company files and information that’s critical to your business on those computers? 

Even if you reformatted the drives, or the drive you replaced isn’t from a machine with critical information on it, that doesn’t mean that it’s not easy to retrieve. Just taking these steps is great- some businesses don’t even erase their data at all
There’s always been a lot of confusion on the steps you need to take to make sure your information is irretrievable from a hard drive you’re getting rid of. You need to make sure to dispose of your hard drive properly- and be sure to take steps to ensure you’re data can’t be recovered. Although there are software solutions that erase hard drives completely, we recommend destroying a hard drive by shredding it or crushing it, which turns your hard drive into thousands of pieces of metal, plastic, and electronic components. 

To help guarantee that your hard drive will never be accessed again, here are several hard drive shredding options: 

Mechanical Hard Drive Destruction in Woodland Hills

Mechanical or physical hard drive destruction is exactly what you think it is- it eliminates the chance of accessing data on that drive by rendering it completely useless. There are several ways our experts can use to guarantee your hard drive is destroyed. We recommend employing at least two tactics for every hard drive you’re looking to get rid of. 

Hard Drive Degaussing 

Degaussing uses an electromagnetic field to destroy data on a hard drive. This field is generated by a machine that messes up the way the hard drive stores data and makes it completely unreadable. A certified hard drive destruction company will use a degaussing machine that adheres to NSA and DoD standards to ensure your data is no longer accessible. 

Hard Drive Shredding

Hard drive shredding turns your hard drive into thousands of tiny pieces. Any reputable hard-drive destruction company will have specialized industrial shredders that can destroy just about anything- but to ensure your data wasn’t compromised they take additional steps to ensure your data is secure. Before your hard drive is shredded, it will be secured in a locked bin, and can even be monitored via video surveillance to maintain chain of custody. 

Hard Drive Crushing

hard drive destruction crushing shredding Woodland Hills

A hard drive crushing machine breaks the platters that store information on drive (along with the rest of the hard drive). Since the drive isn’t in thousands of pieces, this isn’t as effective as shredding a hard drive, but it does ensure your hard drive will not be used in its regular capacity ever again. 

Hard drive crushing machines are also very portable and less expensive piece of equipment compared to other hard drive destruction machines. It’s easy to rent one, or to have a professional shredding company bring it onsite. Keep in mind that doing any kind of hard drive destruction (or any internal electronic or document destruction) yourself has its own risks. 

Wiping vs Mechanical Destruction—What Works Best?

If you want a guarantee that no one will recover your data, use all of the above. Any time electronic equipment that stores data leaves the premises permanently, any electronic storage device should be degaussed and destroyed. 

If you’re sending it to be destroyed, you should have the electronic media destruction company degauss it before it’s shredded or crushed. That way, you have ensured that every piece of that destroyed hard drive is completely unusable. 

Get Free Quotes on Hard Drive Destruction in Woodland Hills Today!

Our contractors offer hard drive destruction services and hard drive shredding services that ensure that all data on your drives is completely destroyed. We’ll help you decide what the best course of action is for your secure hard drive destruction project. 
Let us help you find a secure hard drive destruction company in Woodland Hills. To get Free, No Obligation Quotes on hard drive shredding, just fill out the form to the left, or simply give us a call at (310) 606-2066 today.

Woodland Hills Document Shredding
20929 Ventura Blvd
Woodland Hills, CA 91364
Phone: (310) 606-2066
Email: info@woodlandhillsdocumentshredding.com