How do I wipe a modern SSD to prevent data recovery?

User_already_exist@lemmy.world to Asklemmy@lemmy.ml – 111 points –

I understand traditional methods don’t work with modern SSD, anyone knows any good way to do it?

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For all average user requirements that just involve backups, PII docs, your sex vids, etc (e.g. not someone who could be persecuted, prosecuted, or murdered for their data) your best bet (other than physical destruction) is to encrypt every usable bit in the drive.

  1. Download veracrypt
  2. Format the SSD as exFAT
  3. Create a new veracrypt volume on the mounted exFat partition that uses 100% of available space (any format).
  4. open up a notepad and type out a long random ass throwaway password e.g. $-963,;@82??/@;!3?$.&$-,fysnvefeianbsTak62064$@/lsjgegelwidvwggagabanskhbwugVg, copy it, and close/delete without saving.
  5. paste that password for the new veracrypt volume, and follow the prompts until it starts encrypting your SSD. It'll take a while as it encrypts every available bit one-by-one.

Even if veracrypt hits a free space error at the end of the task, the job is done. Maybe not 100%, but 99.99+% of space on the SSD is overwritten with indecipherable gibberish. Maybe advanced forensics could recover some bits, but a) why the fuck would they go to that effort for a filthy commoner like yourself, and b) what are the chances that 0.01% of recoverable data contains anything useful!?! You don't really need to bother destroying the header encryption key (as apple and android products do when you wipe a device) as you don't know the password and there isn't a chance in hell you or anyone else is gonna guess, nor brute force, it.

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