data shredder

[Amedee Van Gasse (ub)]

On Mon, December 21, 2009 14:24, Thomas K Gamble wrote:

> I especially like the comment that the chances of overwritten data being
> recovered from a modern hard drive amount to "urban legend".
>
> If the idea that a single overwrite is sufficient is to be believed then
> we must
> assume that the stories of the FBI and other law enforcement agencies
> recovering data from hard drives, the data must not have been overwritten,
> or at least not thoroughly overwritten.

The emphasis is on *modern* hard drives.
The stories were true once, or at least they were more than a theoretical
method, which doesn't mean that they were ever used on a large scale.

But they moved in the realms of urband legendry about 15 years ago.
You will notice that most scientific research papers on the subject were
published before the eighties or early nineties.
I have yet to see a scientifically sound research paper published after 2005.


I'm an adherent of the cock-up theory (aka Hanlon's Razor), which says
that stupidity is usually more likely than intent to be the cause of
problemns.


Don't we all love TV shows like CSI and NCIS where they _always_ solve the
crime in less than 50 minutes? Near-perfect data recovery is just a tool
to help the storyline. Real life sucks.

-- 
Amedee