If you’re disposing of an old device, you likely remove personal information to protect your data. Yet, one study analyzed 159 drives bought on eBay and found sensitive data present on 42% of them.
Malicious software and targeted attacks put companies at risk. They can affect brand equity, customer loyalty, partnerships with vendors, and even lead to fines.
Keep reading for a beginner’s guide to data erasure and how to choose data erasure software.
What Is Data Erasure?
Data erasure is one method of achieving data sanitization and can be done in several ways.
The most popular method is to use software to overwrite data with random patterns of ones and zeros. This method is called “overwriting” or “secure deletion.” The original data is overwritten with new data, making it impossible to recover.
Secure data erasure can occur in all IT environments across various assets. These assets include PCs/laptops, mobile devices, servers, loose drives, and removable media. You can also erase data in larger cloud environments.
Many people associate the following data sanitization methods with data erasure:
- Data deletion
- Factory reset
- Reformatting
- Data wiping
- File shredding
However, the methods above are incomplete. They don’t include the certification and verification necessary to achieve data sanitization. They haven’t been proven to render data unrecoverable.
Why Is Data Erasure Important?
Erasing data can prevent unauthorized individuals from accessing your company’s sensitive information.
Deleting files doesn’t truly delete data. Deleting simply removes pointers to the disk sectors where the data resides. Anyone can quickly recover deleted data with common software tools.
Data sanitization is essential for protecting data and ensuring effective device lifecycle management. It can lessen potential problems with device returns or data migration.
Erasing data helps organizations make sure the data is unrecoverable. It offers organizations tamper-proof certificates of erasure. These are crucial if you want to comply with data protection regulations.
Choosing Certified Data Erasure Software
Data erasure software can be a very effective way of removing personal information from any digital device.
Data erasing software records information on a unit and then erases it. It then leaves behind a database listing of the units that were wiped. The results of the data wipe can be completely documented and fully auditable.
There are many factors to consider when choosing between data erasure software options. These include cost, ease of use, features, and compatibility with other devices and operating systems. You also must consider your company’s reputation and customer service standards.
When researching data erasure software, check out a certified solution like Certus Erasure.
Achieve Data Sanitization Through Efficient Data Erasure
Data erasure is the best way to sanitize your data. With the right software, you can ensure you successfully overwrote the data. You can also provide auditable reports to meet industry standards.
Data erasure is also a good option for organizations for both environmental and commercial reasons. It preserves the resale value of storage devices while also supporting green initiatives.
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