43
votes
How to safely wipe a USB flash drive
To quote the ISM (Australia's military standards for cyber security).
Security Control: 0359; In flash memory media, a technique known as wear levelling ensures that writes are distributed evenly ...
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24
votes
Accepted
How to safely wipe a USB flash drive
Next time you're about to put sensitive data on a flash drive, consider encrypting it first! Strongly encrypted data is useless without the key, and if you securely erase the drive first, all that ...
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17
votes
How to safely wipe a USB flash drive
A quick check at amazon.com shows 64GB USB drives in non-designer cases go for about $20. Less if you buy in bulk.
Since you want "quick and efficient" lets factor in the time needed to overwrite the ...
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14
votes
Accepted
RAM Encryption. Is it possible?
Without adding any additional hardware, is RAM encryption possible?
Sure.
You can encrypt whatever you like in RAM, just like you encrypt everything else.
The more interesting quesstion is "where are ...
- 9,720
10
votes
Accepted
Recovery of EEPROM data after bulk erase operation
summary
If you decap the dies, you can. The pads exist but are not bonded but available. The reason that you can get the information is that the timers that are used to inject and tunnel the ...
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5
votes
Is moving data between devices on an SD Card safer than a USB stick?
While SD cards cannot be programmed to behave as a different key of USB device like a keyboard (i.e. Bad USB) they have their own vulnerabilities since they also contain firmware which can be hacked. ...
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5
votes
Is there a real-world example of SSD data recovery?
Recovery is only possible under certain conditions:
have an older SSD with no TRIM support
or
have Windows XP (as it does not support TRIM) or another old OS with no TRIM support
or
you connect the ...
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5
votes
Can wiped SSD data be recovered?
I'd like to refer to this video.
It explains how data can be recovered from HDDs using thresholds. Which includes that the given signal-level returned from a HDD ain't only based on the current ...
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4
votes
RAM Encryption. Is it possible?
Absolutely, particularly if you are using RAM as non-persistent storage in which case you can encrypt it like any disk, file or directory after partitioning it off and mounting it in namespace.
...
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4
votes
Is there a real-world example of SSD data recovery?
My very first thought:
Nobody can be absolutely sure that something has not happened, so the only acceptable answer to your question would be an example. I'm trying to explain my thoughts on why you ...
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4
votes
Accepted
How to physically destroy an SSD at home?
The most practical option for physically destroying an SSD is to simply use a hammer. If you can, open the SSD and locate the data-bearings chips and make sure that each chip is sufficiently destroyed....
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3
votes
Accepted
Read-only vs. Write-protected
Read-only means one can only read from it. Write-protected means that writing is possible but controlled. Those controls can fail.
If "read-only" is defined in the hardware, then it will always be ...
- 128k
3
votes
Is it possible to retrieve flash-based encrypted disks content (SSD, cellphones, USB sticks, ...) after password wipe/replacement?
It is indeed possible that the block containing the key cannot be properly erased. That's why LUKS uses AFsplit to store the key on disk.
The idea is essentially to expand a key that would normally ...
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2
votes
How do I securely erase USB flash drives?
Encrypt a large picture of noise such that the file size occupies most of the drive. Do the same for a medium sized picture and then a small picture. Copy the large picture to the drive and if you ...
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2
votes
Can wiped SSD data be recovered?
Encrypted data cannot be decrypted unless you use the hash key or password, but it is an offence to withhold the key when ordered to reveal it by a court.
Also, securely shredding may get rid of the ...
- 21
2
votes
My boss knew I had put a file onto a memory stick?
This depends on the logging which was in place on your system when you were doing the copy. Logging the file copy is not enabled by default.
There are other programs you can indirectly get that ...
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2
votes
Linux command to wipe files on an SD Card?
Flash storage is inherently different from spinning disk storage at a physical, and operational level. Unlike spinning disks, flash storage has a limited amount of write cycles. The solution to ...
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2
votes
How is it possible that hardware-encrypted flash devices are safe?
How is this in the case of hardware-encrypted pendrives? E.g. this one. Does one always require installation of drivers / software for such a device?
Yep, generally devices like that require special ...
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2
votes
Is there a real-world example of SSD data recovery?
Modern solid state drives use SED (Self-Encrypting Drive) for secure erasure, specifically via the ATA Enhanced Security Erase functionality found in many drives. The drives store an encryption key in ...
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2
votes
I snapped my micro SD card into 8 pieces before throwing it away. Should I be worried that someone can get my data?
Should you be worried? No!
Is it technically possible, probably.
Here is an example SD card Xray, although not specifically a SanDisk.
The memory chips are very small and unless you broke that ...
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1
vote
How to physically destroy an SSD at home?
If you really want to be sure the data is unrecoverable, take the drive to a place that does document and hard drive shredding. They'll put the drive through a machine that will shred it into ...
- 22.7k
1
vote
Recovery of EEPROM data after bulk erase operation
You are looking for details on the phenomenon of data remanence. There is not much data freely available.
The semi manufacturers have little incentive to perform in-depth testing, There are no ...
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1
vote
How is it possible that hardware-encrypted flash devices are safe?
The device may come with its read-only software that can run only from USB. This can protect from virus etc.
As usual (this is a guess since there is no doc around), a random key is generated for ...
- 5,519
1
vote
Understanding the philosophy of recovering data
As you said you were not interested in technical detail, I will give a rough, top level approach to answer your question.
First off, flash drives have a built-in process called wear leveling where ...
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1
vote
Linux command to wipe files on an SD Card?
Are there any commands, tools or python libraries to securely wipe files from an SD card (flash memory)?
There are many tools that can "securely" wipe files from the "block-level" disk (i.e., the ...
- 5,001
1
vote
Is it possible to retrieve flash-based encrypted disks content (SSD, cellphones, USB sticks, ...) after password wipe/replacement?
To wipe the entire drive, all you have to do is wipe the spot that stores the encryption of K
That statement is correct under its theoretical form. If you can guarantee you can wipe the key, and no ...
- 5,406
1
vote
Accepted
Is it possible to retrieve flash-based encrypted disks content (SSD, cellphones, USB sticks, ...) after password wipe/replacement?
You mean that when you overwrite or delete data on a flash-drive, the microcontroller in that flash-drive doesn't immediately delete or overwrite the block, but instead put them on a 'delete-in-future-...
- 2,770
1
vote
How to encrypt data on flash drive to decrypt on another system?
Unfortunately all the slick methods of Full Disk Encryption are all native to the OS, and so only available on that OS, so if you need cross-platform support you have to use a more nerdy solution like ...
- 15.5k
1
vote
How do I securely erase USB flash drives?
@Damon suggested in a comment to use a hammer. Considering that USB flash drives are now cheap, and that is is hard to guess exactly what the firmware actually does, if I really wanted to securely ...
- 26.4k
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