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Drill out HD? What to do with Dead 2018 MacBook Pro and Data on it

L

late show

macrumors member
Original poster
Nov 13, 2008
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My 2018 MacBook Pro suddenly stopped working and cannot start up. I tried everything to revive it and according to Apple Store people (2 visits) it is most likely the logic board and not worth repairing.

They suggested I recycle it at apple.

My data is still on the hard drive.

My question is:

is it safe handing over my dead laptop with my data on it to apple? or should I find out where the hard drive is and put a drill through it like the old days.
 
Juicy Box said:
Have you tried Target Disk Mode?
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Read again. OP wants to know about what could happen to his data, not about retrieving the data. I guess it's backed up.

I wouldn't worry. I can't see why someone, apple or others would spend time and energy on digging out some personal data and perhaps passwords. Besides, if it has the T2 chip and a reasonably recent version of macOS, it would be pretty difficult if not impossible.
 
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If dead, unplug, unscrew, open it up and remove the drive. Since you are not concerned with it working after you do this surgery, you don't even have to be that careful during the surgery.

Locate the drive, remove, then destroy/dispose of it as you see fit. A few drilled holes (and optionally water for a good while can do much damage). High powered magnet? Sledgehammer adventures?

I just changed my own battery in another generation of MBpro. Getting inside is relatively trivial. Online searches will help you locate the drive. Then have it.
 
Juicy Box said:
Who said anything about retrieving data?

If you can access the drive via Target Disk Mode, you can wipe it and make sure that no one can access it.
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If OP has two Macs.

I would drill the board soldered SSD lol
 
Assuming this is a 2018 15", there is no hard drive to remove. The chips are soldered to the board. In theory that drive *should* be encrypted by the T2 and therefore not accessible without your credentials, but if you absolutely must be sure the data is gone, then yes, physical destruction of the board is your only option.
 
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The above is correct, data cannot be read without THE MATCHING T2 chip which has encryption key. Theoretically, someone could revive the board and get access to the data, Apple cannot afford to do this, it would be public disaster. Since SSD cannot be wiped in any meaningful way, Apple recommended procedure to "wipe" the disk is encrypt the disk with FileVault and forget/destroy the FV key. If you were using FileVault, no one can read your data.
 
If you don’t need the data, a hammer has worked well for me in the past. Once you can shake the drive and hear the shattered platter in there, you’re good.

For SSD’s, I actually don’t know the proper way to go about destroying those.
 
I take out the hard drive, and let my 7 year old loose with a hammer on it and then I weirdly just throw it in a bucket of water and leave it in the garden behind the shed till I remember it and then throw it away!
 
Apple will not just 'throw away the machine' once they receive it. They will hand it off to one of their recyclers who will take it apart and salvage what parts they can. The motherboard will be handed over to a 3rd party repair center authorized by Apple to see if they can fix the motherboard, if they can then all data will be wiped as per laws on data privacy, but if they cannot then the chips that hold the data should be drilled through. The question is, do you trust Apple to do what's right with your machine? if you do then leave it as it is. If you do not trust Apple or one of it's repair/recycle partners then drill the the chips.
 
laptech said:
Apple will not just 'throw away the machine' once they receive it. They will hand it off to one of their recyclers who will take it apart and salvage what parts they can. The motherboard will be handed over to a 3rd party repair center authorized by Apple to see if they can fix the motherboard, if they can then all data will be wiped as per laws on data privacy, but if they cannot then the chips that hold the data should be drilled through. The question is, do you trust Apple to do what's right with your machine? if you do then leave it as it is. If you do not trust Apple or one of it's repair/recycle partners then drill the the chips.
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Unless you personally know and personally trust every tech who will touch the device, like you wouldn’t mind them seeing what’s on the drive and trust after seeing it they wouldn’t speak of or share it, that’s a hard no
 
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InvertedGoldfish said:
Unless you personally know and personally trust every tech who will touch the device, like you wouldn’t mind them seeing what’s on the drive and trust after seeing it they wouldn’t speak of or share it, that’s a hard no
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It is not a case of personally knowing every tech, it is a case of knowing if the tech will follow the rule of law. If users data is not deleted as the law dictates when repairing and selling on repaired/refurbished motherboards and that data finds itself into public domain, when the company gets sued for breaches of privacy, the tech would have to explain why did they go snooping around in the users data and release into the wild when all their job required was to delete to bring it back to factory default settings.

I've worked in the repair industry long enough to know that snooping of data on a users/customers device by repair tech does go on, regardless of how much techs profess that such things do not go on. I've personally seen techs do it, get caught and get sacked for it. Therefore, if the OP's machine was able to be repaired then in my repair experience what ever is within the storage device will get looked at. So drill it.
 
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For people suggesting to take out the drive and physically destroy it, that’s not really an option here as the storage chips are soldered onto the main board of the computer.
 
laptech said:
Therefore, if the OP's machine was able to be repaired then in my repair experience what ever is within the storage device will get looked at. So drill it.
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Again, with T2 Macs like these the storage is always encrypted even if FileVault is not enabled. The data isn’t accessible even if the computer were repaired, and there’s no separate disk to remove here- the storage is soldered on.
Pages 5 and 6 in this document provide details: https://www.apple.com/mideast/mac/docs/Apple_T2_Security_Chip_Overview.pdf
 
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chrfr said:
For people suggesting to take out the drive and physically destroy it, that’s not really an option here as the storage chips are soldered onto the main board of the computer.
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Drill a hole through the SSD chips. Boom! Problem solved.
 
Perhaps the computer can still be repaired. Consider checking with other resources than the Apple Store. My experience is that the Apple Store offers few alternatives when there is a logic board issue on an older computer.
 
A propane torch will unsolder the drive and if left on long enough will fry the chips. I have seen videos of unsoldering the chips with a goo hair dryer.
 
Apple can eliminate firmware passwords if you bring in the computer and proof of purchase. Don’t know why they couldn’t eliminate any other passwords on the computer.
 
HobeSoundDarryl said:
If dead, unplug, unscrew, open it up and remove the drive. Since you are not concerned with it working after you do this surgery, you don't even have to be that careful during the surgery.
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You can totally remove the motherboard and destroy the SSD part of it, but you can't really "remove the drive" from a 2018 MacBook Pro. It's not a separate component.
 
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I became aware it was soldered after posting but not aware it's fully bonded to the mother board. If soldered, OP could cut it lose and destroy it. If fully bonded, OP could just destroy it on the board. A drill would easily do the task whether connected or disconnected to main board.
 
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