What is the best way to destroy a laptop so that nothing on it is recoverable? - Asking for a friend obviously

[Kickster]

99% sure this nigga got cp

 

[Xarpho]

Doesn’t matter if you try to burn it, destroy it, use military grade erasing software, throw it out…the feds and glowies that keep tabs on Kiwi Farms are probably already onto you.

 

[Neigh]

Modern SSDs have a built in secure erase feature and some motherboards support it. All it does it erase the SSD's internal encryption key so the data can no longer be accessed. Unless you have nation-state secrets, no one cares enough to break the encryption.

 

[Secret Messages]

They catch you when you’re downloading, not when you’re deleting. If you were dumb enough to download on the clearnet, then you should probably burn the drive. Realistically though, glowie honeypots are only designed to catch the absolute bottom feeder technologically illiterate pedos that post on forums asking for CP on the clearnet. For most people, just smash it into dust with a hammer and mix it into your trash the day before pickup.

If the illegal material you’re downloading was CP, consider disposing of yourself after the drive.

 

[Cybertonia]

If you're just trying to destroy a hard drive because you're dumping the machine and you're paranoid that people care at all about your e-trash -- quarter-inch drill bit through the platters, at least three of them. Or just keep the drive, I have a literal pile of them in my e-waste closet.

If you're trying to destroy a hard drive because you think the police want it -- you're already fucked because if the drive is missing and you can't explain where it is when they come asking for it then your ass is getting charged with obstruction

 

[Ol Dirty Fatso]

I hear home depot has a pretty good sale on ropes right now. Go get yourself a bargain.

 

[serious n00b]

my e-waste closet.

Can I see a photo of this

 

[draggs]

Bury it in the woods somewhere

Don't take your phone with you. And not the woods behind your house

Unless you're being physically surveilled they're never gonna find it under a couple feet of dirt in a state or national park/forest

Then jump off a cliff in said park/forest

 

[CryoRevival #SJ-112]

Assuming you are not trying to conceal a crime but , you are going to run headlong into the "why spend thousands on tech recovery when I can smash his kneecaps with a $4 hammer to get what I want from the suspect" issue.

But if you really must, just open it up and smash it with said $4 hammer.

 

[Smaug's Smokey Hole]

Funnily, on the other hand, encrypting all your data and then not wanting to give the key to law enforcement might - and this is depending on where you live - actually be more helpful because some countries have rules making it impossible to punish somebody for refusing to bring forth evidence against himself in such a manner or make it impossible to force somebody to cooperate in an investigation against oneself in such a way.

One absurd interpretation of that happened in Finland some years ago due to their interpretation of EU law. A guy was driving hella drunk and hit someone that later died, he had fled the scene at that point of course but iirc the person would have survived if he had called an ambulance. He was found, charged and convicted of that but freed for not calling an ambulance and not reporting the accident. Doing that would incriminate himself because driving drunk is illegal. If he had been sober it would have been a different story.

 

[Seasoned News Reporter]

I would suggest lava but traveling to where you can throw it into some lava is an adventure on it's own. Honestly you could probably just rent a wood chipper or something & throw it in there piece by piece. I'm pretty sure there are e-waste disposal sites that you can take it to & have them basically throw it in a kind of shredder for computer parts. Pretty sure you can watch the process if not outright throw it in yourself but don't quote me on that.

 

[Aidan]

If OP hasn't figured it out by now then they need to destroy their self so that nothing is recoverable.

 

[Shig O'nella]

Pull the drive.
Hit it with a sledgehammer til you are tired.
Pick up the pieces and go for a walk along the river.
Drop the pieces one at a time into the river during your walk.
Job done. Ain't no one getting that data back.

 

[TracdacianTortoise]

One absurd interpretation of that happened in Finland some years ago due to their interpretation of EU law. A guy was driving hella drunk and hit someone that later died, he had fled the scene at that point of course but iirc the person would have survived if he had called an ambulance. He was found, charged and convicted of that but freed for not calling an ambulance and not reporting the accident. Doing that would incriminate himself because driving drunk is illegal. If he had been sober it would have been a different story.

This is an extension of the right to remain silent, basically the right not to be forced to incriminate yourself. It’s the reason you can’t be thrown in jail generally for not giving a password to an encrypted disk. However, biometrics is another issue, because it’s not knowledge, so it’s get murky, and even in the US, biometrics are fair game. Varies by country, but most countries that have common law in their legislative history will have a right to remain silent.

 

[Harbinger of Kali Yuga]

Sounds like OP needs to destroy himself first.

 

[Sarcastic sockpuppet]

Just damage it a bit, then dump it in e-waste service it will go unnoticed into the sea of other trash disk full of p and gore. Have you ever seen a trash disposal site? There is mountains of stuff out there.
Poisoning yourself with poisons gas, burnigng yourself in acids or setting your place on fire trying to get rid of incriminating evidence is the most sus you can act.

 

[AmpleApricots]

One absurd interpretation of that happened in Finland some years ago due to their interpretation of EU law.

It's a pity that such cases are often abused as "proof" to whittle away rights you'll never get back once taken away.

This is an extension of the right to remain silent, basically the right not to be forced to incriminate yourself.

Yes, I think the UK (big surprise there) is one of the countries where this doesn't apply and you have to hand out passwords. Not sure though.

---
In our current electronic age where everyone has at least one device with mass storage, I think "encrypt everything" should be right up there with "don't talk to cops.". Most countries judicatives are incredibly sloppy and generous with giving law enforcement permission to just take all electronic devices from people for analysis in blanket investigations with only as much as a smithering of suspicion sometimes. These devices often hold very private data but are often not very well protected by privacy laws as by the time many of these laws were written, computers smaller than a warehouse didn't even exist and no government rushes to update such laws to protect your privacy better. You might end up with a visit from the police because you said a bad word somewhere or about the wrong person, had malware on your computer/proprietary chinese router you weren't aware of and/or your IP showed up in the wrong server log. Sometimes the police and especially such "electronic forensics" units are understaffed, overworked and desperate for results and might log you for whatever minor (no, not that kind of minor) shit they can find or even might outright plant evidence. Prove something *wasn't* on your harddrive, good luck - it's easier to just plant a GB of child porn on your unencrypted smartphone and make it look like you looked at it regularily and religiously than to plant a gun in your dresser and the punishment for the former is often magnitudes bigger - it'll be much harder to plant files on you with fully encrypted drives because that would mean a lot of noticeable tampering, it's also harder to plant trojans and other malware on your devices undetected this way - in some parts of the world, this is allowed in investigations. Let alone shit some malware that brought you into the focus of the investigation might've put on your device.

Encryption is easy, well implemented by most OSes and well supported by pretty much all modern and semi-mordern hardware. There even exist fast encryption algorithms for hardware that has no hardware acceleration for it. There's no reason not to encrypt. This becomes more important the more authoritarian governments become.

 

[Amerimutt]

Crazy World of Arthur Brown - Fire

Album: Crazy World of Arthur Brown / Year: 1968 / Written by Arthur Brown, Vincent Crane, Mike Finesilver and Peter Ker / Produced by Kit Lambert Lyrics: I a...

www.youtube.com

 

[Smaug's Smokey Hole]

It's a pity that such cases are often abused as "proof" to whittle away rights you'll never get back once taken away.

I only want to abuse it as proof that Brussels should go fuck themselves.

 

[khaine]

Thermite