ITPEC FE Morning April 2018 Question 44
When a normally functioning hard disk of a PC on which confidential files are stored is handed over to an industrial waste disposal vendor, which of the following is an appropriate countermeasure against information leakage?
Explanation
Overwriting the whole disk with random bits several times — only destroying the data itself, on every sector, prevents recovery.
Deleting, renaming or reformatting leaves the stored bits on the disk, and recovery tools can read them back. Before a working disk leaves the organization, every area of it, including free and unused space, is overwritten with random bit patterns several times so the original contents cannot be reconstructed. Degaussing or physical destruction are the alternatives.
Answer (d)
Why not others:
- •(a) — renaming changes only the directory entry; the file contents stay on the disk unchanged
- •(b) — compression is reversible; anyone who gets the disk can decompress the files and read them
- •(c) — the master boot record holds only the boot code and partition table; the partitions and files can still be found by scanning the rest of the disk
Key rule: Secure disposal must destroy the data, not just the way to find it: overwrite every sector, degauss, or physically destroy the medium.
Security · AI-written, may contain errors
This question comes from an official ITPEC past paper. ITPEC Practice is an independent study tool and is not affiliated with ITPEC. See the official FE past-paper collection or Report an issue.