A major story has broken today with the news that 34% of hard drives that have been disposed of still had personal data help on them. A BBC story even advised that codes for the shooting down of inter continental missles and private data from NHS computers has been found on hard drives obtained as part of a test study by the University of Glamorgan.

The study bought, at random, 300 hard drives from computer fairs, pc shops and online auctions from the UK, US, Australia, Germany and other countries. The purpose of this study was to expose fraud and identity theft.

Examples of the data losses included finding bank account details, medical records and personal identity numbers as well as data about a proposed $50bn currency exchange through Spain.

However perhaps the most alarming find was details of test launch procedures for the THAAD (Terminal High Altitude Area Defence) ground-to-air missile defence system which was found on a disk bought on eBay.

Dr Andy Jones, head of information security research at BT, said: "It is clear that a majority of organisations and private individuals still have no idea about the potential volume and type of information that is stored on computer hard disks."

"Businesses also need to be aware that they could also be acting illegally by not disposing of this kind of data properly."

ABC Data Recovery offer a secure data wiping service that will ensure no trace of the previous data can ever be found, we specialise in Secure Data Wiping and will provide certification to confirm that your data has been wiped forever. Our advice is to NEVER throw away or simply give away a hard drive that contains your personal data of any kind.

If you have any concerns about this story or would like information about our Data Wiping Services then please contact us either via the contact form or ring our 0845 2002 845 number.

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