How to permanently wipe data off a SSD?

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lsquare

Senior member
Jan 30, 2009
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For hard drives, I've been using DBAN for the longest time. From my understand of SSDs, they're different from hard drives in terms of how it stores its data. Are there any tools available that works like DBAN in permanently wipe data off a SSD so that I can safely pass my SSD to another person?
 
taltamir

taltamir

Lifer
Mar 21, 2004
13,576
6
76
SSDs have spare are which they CYCLE constantly. Simply writing 0s to the entire drive's visible size will not erase all data, it will leave the data on the spare area. (plus there are the issues with writing 0s in SSDs, you should write 1s)

Supposedly all SSDs have a "secure erase" command you can give them, which will prompt the controller to purge the tables and write 1s to the entire thing. Many HDDs have the same command as well (so I hear), which will write 0s to the entire HDD.

Look for instructions on how to restore SSD performance to new condition from used. Originally for dealing with slowdowns due to lack of TRIM, following those should involve the secure erase command IIRC.

A good portion of the above is all second hand knowledge to me though, I have not yet gotten around to actually securing erasing an SSD. So take it with a grain of salt. Hopefully some other users could help clarify, contradict, or what have you.
 
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lsquare

Senior member
Jan 30, 2009
748
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jimhsu said:
DBAN does not get areas such as reallocated sectors. HDDErase does. The reason for the recommendation should be clear.
Click to expand...

What kind of comment is that? How am I suppose to know? No, it wasn't clear before.
 
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sub.mesa

Senior member
Feb 16, 2010
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DBAN works by overwriting the same sector multiple times; so that residual magnetism on the platter's tracks would dissipate with each time you overwrite the same location.

However, on SSDs when you write to a sector the second time, it will write somewhere else instead. When you write to the sector the third time, it will write somewhere else again. Thus, DBAN is useless and just wastes erase cycles.

Doing a simple secure erase would kill all data structure. Meaning: al data is still there, but you don't know anymore how it was organised. The data in flash cell 1 could be at the start of the partition or somewhere else; we do not know what is the beginning and the end anymore; it's like you take a book, put all the words in a basket and you wouldn't be able to make sentences anymore or know what was written in the book; all you have are the words and CAN make up sentences but you lost the way they related to eachother (meaning: the structure that makes a sentence and gives those words meaning).

If you want to be really sure, perform a zero-write after the secure erase. But normally, performing a secure erase will cause irreparable dataloss.
 
taltamir

taltamir

Lifer
Mar 21, 2004
13,576
6
76
DBAN works by overwriting the same sector multiple times; so that residual magnetism on the platter's tracks would dissipate with each time you overwrite the same location.
Click to expand...
Which is utterly pointless. You would need alien magi-tech from the future to get anything off of a sector was zeroed ONCE. Multiple writing of random data is utter pointlessness.

However, some theoretical physicists theorized that it might be possible to actually maybe get something out of the "residual magnetism". maybe, in theory. Currently we have explored anti-matter power generation and wormhole generation to a greater extent than the recovery of data from a HDD that was zero filled. So expect to be teleporting around the universe in your own private spaceship before you can restore something off of a drive who was zero filled.
 
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Old Hippie

Diamond Member
Oct 8, 2005
6,361
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If you want to be really sure, perform a zero-write after the secure erase.
Click to expand...

When you get to the final step in HDDErase it will give you the option for an enhanced secure erase....

Q: What is the difference between secure erase and enhanced secure erase?

A: Secure erase overwrites all user data areas with binary zeroes. Enhanced
secure erase writes predetermined data patterns (set by the manufacturer) to
all user data areas, including sectors that are no longer in use due to
reallocation.
Click to expand...

Secure erase has been approved by the U.S. National Institute for Standards and Technology (NIST), Computer Security Center
Click to expand...

If it's good enough for those guys, it should be good enough for anyone. :)
 
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erdemali

Member
May 23, 2010
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Old Hippie said:
When you get to the final step in HDDErase it will give you the option for an enhanced secure erase....





If it's good enough for those guys, it should be good enough for anyone. :)
Click to expand...

Would there be any difference in SSD's performance performing secure erase or the enhanced?
 
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adamantinepiggy

Member
May 29, 2010
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I know with Crucial/Microns C300's when you update the firmware with Crucial's bootable ISO firmware updater, part of the update is a complete low level format which "will " wipe out all the data and return the drive to a non-written state.
 
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blackangst1

blackangst1

Lifer
Feb 23, 2005
22,902
2,359
126
If using trim, a simple format will permently erase an SSD. All this talk of zeros and ones is useless on flash storage, and only applicable on magnetic drives. Even then, one pass is enough. Once the SSD drive drops data from previously written blocks on the SSD, its gone. Multiple passes on an SSD also will shorten its life due to wear leveling.

Consider this article: http://techgage.com/article/too_trim_when_ssd_data_recovery_is_impossible/

TRIM is a brand-new ATA command that the OS will issue to the SSD when a certain request is made, such as Delete, Format or Discard. What it does is rather simple, but it's immensely helpful. When you either delete a file, or format the entire SSD, TRIM will purge both the data and the link to it, so in essence, it's gone.
Click to expand...

If youre really paranoid, you can use windows cipher command from CMD prompt. Three passes, once with 0x00, once with 0xff, once with random.
 
Modelworks

Modelworks

Lifer
Feb 22, 2007
16,240
7
76
A very easy way to erase any storage device HDD, SDD, USB, flash cards is to just fill it up with data you don't care if someone recovers. Copy it to the drive leave it their or delete it. Whatever data you had on their before is now gone. No programs needed.

Create a file full of junk whatever size you like, remember that it will be copied multiple times so use something that fits the size of the drive easily. I like 10MB text files but any file will work. The command below will copy it 1000 times and increment the names to fill a 10GB space. Using a larger source file like 100MB will fill a 100GB space. You don't need to worry about figuring out how many times to copy based on drive size. It will run till it errors out from lack of space or you stop it with CTRL+C


Name the file junk.txt and replace f: below with the drive you want to fill with data and run from command prompt. 1001 is the number of times to repeat the copy, change it to anything you like.
Code: 
for /L %%N in (2,1,1001) do copy junk.txt f:\junk%%N.txt
 
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lsquare

Senior member
Jan 30, 2009
748
1
81
Thanks for the information guys, but I would still like to use HDDErase just once just to ease the paranoia when I eliminate my drives.

How do I use HDDErase? It doesn't seem to be as easy to use as DBAN. Which method should I use to erase the data on the drive? It appears HDDErase has several options. I want to select the best method.

Also, the SSD that I want to wipe is being used with my hard drive dock. How do I select the SSD in the hard drive dock from HDDErase?
 
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sub.mesa

Senior member
Feb 16, 2010
611
0
0
blackangst1 said:
If using trim, a simple format will permently erase an SSD.
Click to expand...
A format is a poorly understoof concept, and depends on the OS version of what it means:

Windows XP and up: only reads the whole disk for bad sectors, and overwrites first 20MB.
Windows 7: writes zeroes to entire disk surface

So a format under XP is very different from a format under Windows 7. Under Windows 7 it would indeed overwrite data. It would also do two things:
- mark all space as allocated; meaning the SSD now only has its 6.8% spare space; until you perform manual TRIM or secure erase
- overwrite all data except those contained in the spare area of the SSD; which still holds data even after writing zeroes to all visible sectors on the SSD. i.e. you cannot access the invisible spare area directly.

So a secure erase is highly recommended, and also doesn't cost you any precious write cycles. It's also the only method that reliably destroys the spare space allocation data; without overwriting the flash pages themselves; unless you want to. :)

If you did a format under Windows 7, you may need to perform the Intel Toolbox utility to perform a manual TRIM; since all visible space is now unusable by the SSD as 100% is claimed by the operating system. You would need to use the Intel Toolbox utility to TRIM that area and get lots of free cells back. Unfortunately, not many people realise this, and get degraded performance rapidly.
 
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Old Hippie

Diamond Member
Oct 8, 2005
6,361
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0
How do I use HDDErase?
Click to expand...

Download a bootable HDDErase ISO from here and burn it as an ISO.

Enter the BIOS, set your drives to IDE mode and your CD as the first boot device.

Put the CD in the drive, reboot, and follow the instructions.

It will list all your drives that it can "see" but since I've never used it with a dock, I dunno what to tell ya other than you may have to connect the drive directly to the MB.

When it comes to the actual cleaning mode, I just use option 1.
 
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