topic Re: Scrubbing disk on Alpha 4000 a in Operating System - OpenVMS

Scrubbing disk on Alpha 4000 a

Gilbert Pereira — Tue, 12 Jun 2007 12:44:43 GMT

I have a alpha 4000 using HZ50 disk and need to scub them to toss. What is the best method to accomplish this task?

Re: Scrubbing disk on Alpha 4000 a

Hoff — Tue, 12 Jun 2007 13:05:11 GMT

The erasure requirements can and do vary by the sensitivity of the information contained, and the costs of unintended exposure, and on the particular disk device involved.

Secure Disk Erasure options:

http://64.223.189.234/node/174

For the typical approach and with low-value commercial information, INITIALIZE /ERASE is often deemed sufficient.

For more sensitive information, pattern overwrite erasure, media degaussing, shredding and melting can be required. Old disks themselves are not particularly valuable anymore, and slagging these devices can be a cost-effective solution when sensitive content is involved.

Again, there is no one right answer.

Stephen Hoffman
HoffmanLabs LLC

Re: Scrubbing disk on Alpha 4000 a

Dean McGorrill — Tue, 12 Jun 2007 15:24:09 GMT

if you have a same type disk with junk on it you could do a backup/physical to the drive with sensitive data on it. maybe followed with a init/erase as hoff suggested. if you have a controller on a system you could run a disk exerciser writing all types of patterns on it. just
some ideas, hope it helps -Dean

Re: Scrubbing disk on Alpha 4000 a

Ian Miller. — Wed, 13 Jun 2007 03:40:28 GMT

My usual method is

$ ANAL/MEDIA/EXERCISE=FULL

which writes three patterns to the disk.

This can be considered OK or not depending on your circumstances. If the disks are to be discarded then doing the above then physically breaking them can be done and its fun too :-)