# How can you physically destroy a hard drive? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [January 16, 2003, 9:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-can-you-physically-destroy-a-hard-drive/149059 "2003-01-16T21:07:24Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Llama\_Llogophile](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/49beb7/32.png) [@Llama\_Llogophile](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Llama_Llogophile)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2003, 9:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-can-you-physically-destroy-a-hard-drive/149059/1 "2003-01-16T21:07:24Z")
There was an interesting news piece today about a couple of guys who bought obtained used or discarded computer hard drives. They were able to get data off of many of them, even when they had been reformatted or had a sledgehammer taken to them. So how can you physically destroy a hard drive, with common household items, such that no data can be retrieved? Would buring it work? Applying Drano or bleach? Putting it in the microwave? ---
**Author:** ![Amp](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/6a8cbe/32.png) [@Amp](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Amp)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2003, 9:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-can-you-physically-destroy-a-hard-drive/149059/2 "2003-01-16T21:10:00Z")
Take it out biack, douse it with gasoline, and set it on fire. It should work and they’re all common household items. ---
**Author:** ![Nuke](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/ea666f/32.png) [@Nuke](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nuke)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2003, 9:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-can-you-physically-destroy-a-hard-drive/149059/3 "2003-01-16T21:17:42Z")
Link: > **[MSNBC News - Breaking News and News Today | Latest News](https://www.msnbc.com/)** > > MSNBC breaking news and the latest news for today. Get daily news from local news reporters and world news updates with live audio & video from our team. I find it hard to believe that data could be retrieved from a hard drive after several good solid whacks from a sledge hammer. ---
**Author:** ![Patty\_O\_Furniture](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/96bed5/32.png) [@Patty\_O\_Furniture](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Patty_O_Furniture)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2003, 9:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-can-you-physically-destroy-a-hard-drive/149059/4 "2003-01-16T21:20:42Z")
I don’t see why a reformatting and re-writing wouldn’t work. 1. Erase 2. Reformat 3. Write the value of pi to drive C:\ Surely if the magnetic dipoles all have a new orientation, their previous orientations can not be known. A quick reformat doesn’t actually remove or delete data (I believe), it just flags data as “ok to overwrite”. If it never gets overwritten, it’s still there. ---
**Author:** ![Bongmaster](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/6a8cbe/32.png) [@Bongmaster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bongmaster)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2003, 9:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-can-you-physically-destroy-a-hard-drive/149059/5 "2003-01-16T21:21:44Z")
It all depends on how much damage you do to the platters. As long as they are bent beyond repair its unlikely you’ll get usable data back. Of course your best bet would be to use a proper utility to do it right, no destructive force necessary. ---
**Author:** ![AndrewL](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/3d9bf3/32.png) [@AndrewL](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AndrewL)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2003, 9:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-can-you-physically-destroy-a-hard-drive/149059/6 "2003-01-16T21:22:24Z")
Open the drive. Remove the platters. Get some coarse grit sandpaper and sand the oxide layers off. Or take the drives down to an auto scrapyard, and convince the guy who runs the crane to let you set them under the electromagnet and switch it on. Either of these methods will render the data permanently irretrievable by any method. ---
**Author:** ![Whack-a-Mole](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/whack-a-mole/32/141_2.png) [@Whack-a-Mole](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Whack-a-Mole)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2003, 9:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-can-you-physically-destroy-a-hard-drive/149059/7 "2003-01-16T21:24:42Z")
There is software that will take care of this for you. Here is one such: [Secure Clean](http://www.whitecanyon.com/secureclean_main_erase_hard_drive.htm) There is other software that’ll do this as well. Secure Clean says it conforms to Department of Defense standards which if a very dim memory recalls correctly means not only is a file deleted when you ask it to be but random data is written and deleted three times in the same location as the deleted file once occupied. After that it should be impossible to retreive whatever was once there. ---
**Author:** ![Zagadka](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/zagadka/32/7272_2.png) [@Zagadka](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zagadka)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2003, 9:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-can-you-physically-destroy-a-hard-drive/149059/8 "2003-01-16T21:25:14Z")
Powerful electromagnet. ---
**Author:** ![Splanky](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/b2d939/32.png) [@Splanky](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Splanky)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2003, 9:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-can-you-physically-destroy-a-hard-drive/149059/9 "2003-01-16T21:25:45Z")
Yeah, I think you’re confused Gassendi. The article I read (CNN, probably the same one) mentions sledgehammers, but I don’t think they meant that you can still get info out of a shattered drive. The real point was that if you don’t physically destroy a drive, or if you sell an old drive, it could get in the wrong hands and be used for I.D. fraud, or info harvesting. ---
**Author:** ![hazel-rah](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/73ab20/32.png) [@hazel-rah](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/hazel-rah)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2003, 9:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-can-you-physically-destroy-a-hard-drive/149059/10 "2003-01-16T21:31:16Z")
Yeah, except there’s a few environmental issues there, **Amp**. If you’re concerned about it, before you get rid of a hard drive download [url=“[http://www.tolvanen.com/eraser/](http://www.tolvanen.com/eraser/)”]Eraser\*\*. It’s a freeware data removal utility. Repartition and reformat the drive you want to clean and then let Eraser do about 27 passes on the drive, including filenames. This will protect you from everybody except large government agencies with deep pockets and a major grudge against you. -fh ---
**Author:** ![hazel-rah](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/73ab20/32.png) [@hazel-rah](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/hazel-rah)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2003, 9:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-can-you-physically-destroy-a-hard-drive/149059/11 "2003-01-16T21:32:58Z")
> [@](#): > > Or take the drives down to an auto scrapyard, and convince the guy who runs the crane to let you set them under the electromagnet and switch it on. This will not work. ---
**Author:** ![ftg](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ftg/32/2801_2.png) [@ftg](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ftg)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2003, 9:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-can-you-physically-destroy-a-hard-drive/149059/12 "2003-01-16T21:39:47Z")
A high level format does practically nothing to the contents of the drive. A 10 year old can read most of the contents without any special tools at all. A low level format isn’t much better (with today’s PCs and IDE drives it may not be doable or it will screw up the _performance_ of the drive). Overwriting the data with multiple random patterns, as some utilities do, would stop ordinary people. This is okay if you are donating/selling your PC and having a working hard drive is needed. But it will not stop special hard drive data recovery methods. If you are truly paranoid and you think someone with $$$ will try to recover the data off your drive: rip it open and take a propane torch to it. Heat destroys magnetism. High heat destroys the magnetic material itself. But very few people need to go to this length. (I have recently bought systems/hard drives that had: a lawyer’s files, a doctor’s office files, and a contractor’s with all his business records. I can’t believe people are this stupid. The MIT article is old news.) ---
**Author:** ![sailor](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a587f6/32.png) [@sailor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/sailor)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2003, 9:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-can-you-physically-destroy-a-hard-drive/149059/13 "2003-01-16T21:41:33Z")
There are utilities which will completely erase files from disk. PGP is one of them ---
**Author:** ![AndrewL](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/3d9bf3/32.png) [@AndrewL](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AndrewL)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2003, 9:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-can-you-physically-destroy-a-hard-drive/149059/14 "2003-01-16T21:45:29Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by hazel-rah \* > \*\*This will not work. \*\* Really? A high-powered magnetic field won’t erase magnetic media? Just why is that? ---
**Author:** ![sailor](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a587f6/32.png) [@sailor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/sailor)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2003, 9:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-can-you-physically-destroy-a-hard-drive/149059/15 "2003-01-16T21:50:32Z")
There are utilities which will completely erase files from disk. PGP is one of them ---
**Author:** ![Squink](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/b5e925/32.png) [@Squink](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Squink)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2003, 9:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-can-you-physically-destroy-a-hard-drive/149059/16 "2003-01-16T21:54:33Z")
Drilling a few 1/4" holes through the drive is less messy than a sledgehammer, yet will deter all but the most determined snoop. If you require even more surety, soaking the drilled out drive overnight in water containing drano (NaOH) will corrode the aluminum platter. ---
**Author:** ![sailor](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a587f6/32.png) [@sailor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/sailor)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2003, 10:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-can-you-physically-destroy-a-hard-drive/149059/17 "2003-01-16T22:00:35Z")
There are utilities which will completely erase files from disk. PGP is one of them ---
**Author:** ![Squink](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/b5e925/32.png) [@Squink](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Squink)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2003, 10:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-can-you-physically-destroy-a-hard-drive/149059/18 "2003-01-16T22:00:35Z")
Drilling a few 1/4" holes through the drive is less messy than a sledgehammer, yet will deter all but the most determined snoop. If you require even more surety, soaking the drilled out drive overnight in water containing drano (NaOH) will corrode the aluminum platter. ---
**Author:** ![pravnik](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/8edcca/32.png) [@pravnik](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pravnik)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2003, 10:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-can-you-physically-destroy-a-hard-drive/149059/19 "2003-01-16T22:05:35Z")
Enough! I will take it! I will take it! I will take the hard drive to Mordor, though I do not know the way. ---
**Author:** ![Mangetout](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mangetout/32/19_2.png) [@Mangetout](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mangetout)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2003, 10:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-can-you-physically-destroy-a-hard-drive/149059/20 "2003-01-16T22:13:16Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by ftg \* > **If you are truly paranoid and you think someone with $$$ will try to recover the data off your drive: rip it open and take a propane torch to it. Heat destroys magnetism. High heat destroys the magnetic material itself. But very few people need to go to this length.** I’d have thought tossing it in a good hot bonfire would do it then. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-can-you-physically-destroy-a-hard-drive/149059.md?page=2)