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Best way to securely erase my entire MBP HDD?

panzer06 said:
Once you complete the software erasure methods described above you may avail yourself of any or all of the final hardware solutions listed here.

Remove the disk from the Mac, clamp it to a work bench and drill many, many holes through the entire disk being careful to capture any and all shavings.

Take ventilated disk and shavings and place in smelter. Melt entire disk down to molten metal and silicone.

Boil off all non metallic residue and pour molten metal into 100 tiny spherical casts being sure to remove all residue from smelter.

Remove 100 cooled metal balls. Encase Metal balls into small hot glass figurines shaped like square safes.

Ship figurines to 99 friends, family, and customers, etc as unique gifts, keeping one as a testament to your thoroughness.

Only then will you be certain your data can NEVER be retrieved.

Cheers,
Click to expand...

but what if someone collects all the balls, summons a dragon, and makes a wish?
 
flaneur said:
Spinnerlys, that's what I was getting at: does it delete the data or the data used to access the data (I come from a Windows background, and I don't know the Mac terminology: I was asking whether it deletes the data itself or merely the FAT).

Thanks.
Click to expand...

Step 1: Format. This erases all the directories and all information about the files, the data is still there.

Step 2: "Erase empty space". Since the disk is "officially" empty, "Erase empty space" will wipe out _everything_. You can choose to overwrite with zeroes 1, 7 or 35 times, but anyone who can recover data from your drive after overwriting it once can do much worse things, so 7 or 35 times is a waste of time.
 
Okay. I think I'm following this so far. You need to do something called "overwriting".

But I'm sure I've heard of "underwriters", too. So even if you delete by overwriting something, can't that be found again by using an underwriter?
 
If you truly need super security to the level of no one possibly retrieving what was on the hard drive, EVER, then buy a new hard drive and take the old one out and USE A SLEDGEHAMMER! Done.

There comes a point where in some situations, security matters more than the cost. Take a situation where an original document is needed to legally bind some agreement; copies and electronic versions will not do. You will have to spend money to keep that thing secure and within your control and formulate backup plans in case your initial accessibility is thwarted by life's circumstances. So...you spend the effort and money to do your best to ensure that that document is available when the time arrives for its use.

If you have the above type of scenario in terms of ensuring no one can access your hard drive data, then you need to buy a new drive and just destroy the old one physically first by impact of a hard object bluntly, then in the fire.

Personally, I think that just deleting the data is sufficient for me since the likelihood of some things happening are statistically mute.

Hope this helps.
 
For normal people overwriting once will make the data un-recoverable. If you are a bit paranoid do it 7 times.
 
When erasing disks securely does it matter if you write 0s or random stuff to it? Usually when I erase disks I use /dev/random and it takes like a month to finish writing over a 80GB hard drive even when I use the computer a lot.
 
Guys, as a DoD employee and a computer forensics investigator, here is the lowdown... NOBODY has been able to recover any usable data from a drive that has even been single pass wiped. The DoD used to abide by the 3Pass wipe standard but has now adopted 7 pass. I've taken my GIAC certification and even in these classes NOBODY has been able to recover after a single pass has been made. The only reason why the DoD uses 7 is "in the event of future technological advancements", perhaps someone can figure it out years into the future. But for personal data, I would say that a single pass is going to pack enough stopping power for anyone that has the tools to recover deleted files. If you're trying to protect yourself because you've got something illegal on the drive, then ummm you should go ahead with the paranoid 35Pass. It will take a really long time, probably more than a full day at the least.

Oh yeah and if you keep the drive and decide to physically destroy it later...Well make sure you take it apart fully and scrape the platters down real good with a sander or wire brush. Some data recovery firms have been able to recover data off platter FRAGMENTS that were blown apart from an IED attack. Amazing technology out there.
 
Since 2001, all IDE & SATA HDDs have a built-in data destroy command called Secure Erase, to wipe the entire drive in one pass. It'll even wipe areas on the disk marked off limits (like bad sectors) to the OS and is more effective than multiple passes by software.

I don't know of a Mac utility to access the drive's erase command, but there's a Windows & Linux program. You can try to boot using the 'Ultimate Boot CD' as it comes with HHDErase to activate the drive's secure erase function.

Using data recovery software, I've found that one pass of Secure Erase to be more effective than multiple passes of a software wipe. I was able to find "some" data from the software wipe, and absolutely no data using the HDDs built-in data erase function. Secure Erase also wipes "between" the data tracks for a more effective wipe.

Info on Secure Erase

Ultimate Boot CD
 
The best way is to take the drive out and use HDDERASE in a PC but failing that just boot from Snow Leopard DVD and run Disk Utility and set options for the degree you want to erase and then erase the drive.

EricVT said:
Hi folks.

Recently agreed to sell my early 2008 MBP and I want to do a completely clean install of OSX before handing it off, including securely erasing all of the contents of my current HDD. I don't know what sorts of personal information might be buried away in my computer (emails, Safari and Firefox passwords, etc..)

I don't think that this person would attempt to recover that information or anything, but you never know and I guess I am also thinking about anyone else down the line that gets their hand on the computer that I don't know personally. Maybe I'm being a bit paranoid but better safe than sorry.

What's the most headache-free way to go about doing this?
Click to expand...
 
Would you guys recommend running a secure erase on a HD before returning a computer to Apple for recycling, or is that unnecessary? Anyone know what actually happens to the computers Apple receives through its recycling program?
 
panzer06 said:
Once you complete the software erasure methods described above you may avail yourself of any or all of the final hardware solutions listed here.

Remove the disk from the Mac, clamp it to a work bench and drill many, many holes through the entire disk being careful to capture any and all shavings.

Take ventilated disk and shavings and place in smelter. Melt entire disk down to molten metal and silicone.

Boil off all non metallic residue and pour molten metal into 100 tiny spherical casts being sure to remove all residue from smelter.

Remove 100 cooled metal balls. Encase Metal balls into small hot glass figurines shaped like square safes.

Ship figurines to 99 friends, family, and customers, etc as unique gifts, keeping one as a testament to your thoroughness.

Only then will you be certain your data can NEVER be retrieved.

Cheers,
Click to expand...

This is fairly complete. For the hard drive. But to be certain the data can NEVER be retrieved, you would also have to kill all persons who created the data. Mainly yourself. THEN it will be thorough.
 
JAT said:
This is fairly complete. For the hard drive. But to be certain the data can NEVER be retrieved, you would also have to kill all persons who created the data. Mainly yourself. THEN it will be thorough.
Click to expand...

I would suggest that perhaps, I'm just saying, maybe, that's carrying thoroughness just a bit too far. :eek:

Cheers,
 
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