[Cryptography] Magnetic media destruction question

[Bill Stewart]

On 1/8/26 18:12, Jon Callas wrote:
> Also note that if someone went and made a shredder that could do 2.2mm pieces, they'd have a huge incentive to spread FUD about a mere 2.5mm shredder, and not even really FUD. They'd say that with today's requirements it's time to consider *their* shredder. That's 12% better for the same cost, after all.
> 
> I propose a test: saw a drive in half and then see what can be recovered. That's a 60mm by 120mm semicircle.

My successor as a sysadmin, who got to declassify our VAX-11/780, 
disassembled the RM05 disks and took the stack of 14" platters
down to the machine shop in the basement, where they sandblasted them.

We didn't want to have to get NSA-certified secure erase software,
and *I* certainly didn't want to have a gimongous magnet near the lab,
even inside the RF-tight room, acid has safety and disposal issues,
but hey, the basement had a machine shop.