1. Using Dban to securely overwrite data
by Gianluca sacco

2. Purpose
According to the Department of the Treasury, there are standards specifically in the Division of Purchase & Property. The government audited 58 random hard drives that were going to be either sold with other assets or stored. The audit showed that not only were there issues handling the hard drives, 46 out of the 58 hard drives that were tested had sensitive data on them.

3. policy
The policy states that assets which are over 3,500 shall be kept in storage and anything less than that number will be either disposed of or sold.
Document number DPP states that Once the asset has become obsolete or replaced from normal wear and tear. From that point on, the department and agencies responsible for the asset(s) are instructed to consult this document to prevent stockpiling of said assets. This is to minimize expensive storage.

4. Guidelines
While selling an asset, that agency must reference section 52:27B-67 of the New Jersey revised statutes, which states the opinion of the director matters to allow the asset to be considered surplus obsolete or no longer suitable for use. This can even include donating materials and not even selling them.

5. Personal solution: overwriting data
In this case, you will be using a program to overwrite all fragments of data. Because of the way data is deleted, you are only deleting the ‘shortcut’ for that file, the actual data still exists in fragments. Once the HDD needs more data, it will pick a fragment to overwrite. This means some picture may even have black spots due to some of the data being overwritten. This program is perfect for not only reselling HDD’s on a government surplus level, but as a seller in the civilian community, this would especially be important while selling a laptop or computer to ensure all PII is non-existent. DBAN will be used to achieve this.

6. Real life audits
In 2011, an audit was done to estimate the competence of the State’s controls for redistributing the excess computer equipment and the disposal of said surplus equipment. This audit also included the protection of all sensitive or confidential information on them.
The audit found that out of the 58 hard drives that were tested, 46 of them had data still in them. This data in found on these hard drives included, tax returns, social security numbers, phone numbers and passwords for said computers these hard drives were used in.

7. References
Boxer, Mathew. “DISPOSITION OF EXCESS AND SURPLUS COMPUTER EQUIPMENT.” Nj.gov, 9 Mar. 2011, Karnas, Henry. “CIRCULAR STATE OF NEW JERSEY DEPARTMENT OF THE TREASURY.” Nj.gov, 15 Aug. 2007, policies/Business%20Office% A.pdf.