Keeps Things Tidy and Protected Before the Pros Pick Them Up

As a commercial enterprise, your company is tasked with a crucial role in correctly storing and protecting hard drives and other media with your customers’ personal information. This responsibility is not just to protect your reputation and remain compliant, but also to empower you in the fight against cybercrime. From time to time, it is necessary to have hard drives destroyed. 

You cannot take a hammer to a hard drive or other media and beat the data out of it. A good cyber criminal can do what all the king’s horses and all the king’s men couldn’t do with Humpty Dumpty. They can put the pieces back together again and cause mayhem when they are done. While you are waiting on the scheduled day to have your data, media, or trademarked products picked up for destruction, it’s vital to store these items properly. Once your preferred shredding company gathers everything together, you can breathe easier, knowing they will use their commercial-grade shredders to eradicate every bit of data possible and give you a certificate of destruction. All it takes is one phone call to ease your mind.

Tips for Properly Storing Hard Drives and Other Media Before Being Destroyed

Ensure data security and compliance with regulations by correctly handling all hard drives, media, and products before they are taken for destruction. These tips will help you lower the risk of theft and fraud:

1. Use secure storage containers: Keeping things in secure storage containers will help keep unnecessary intrusions. Investing in tamper-proof containers to store hard drives and other media is helpful. Next, store those containers in a locked cabinet or room to prevent unauthorized access. Be sure to clearly label these containers with the contents and the destruction date for proper tracking.
2. Limit access: It’s vital to limit who has access to these things. Consider restricting access to the storage area only to those who need to use the information. Set up an access log to track who enters and exits the storage area. Finally, regular audits should be conducted to ensure that only authorized team members have access to the stored media.
3. Organize and inventory: It’s helpful to organize your media by type and destruction date for easy retrieval. Regular inventory checks will also help you keep an account of your stored media. Keep detailed records of stored media, including make, model, serial number, and destruction schedule. (As a side note: Your accounting department will love this step!)
4. Implement security measures: For some companies, installing security cameras to monitor the storage area may be helpful. You may also want an alarm system to alert you in the event an unauthorized team member attempts to access the area. 
5. Work with professionals: Setting this type of system up may seem a little over the top. Working with a professional information management company can help alleviate the stress of managing your documents. They have the systems to securely hold your records and set them up for destruction according to your schedule. 

Work with Professionals Who Can Help Maintain and Destroy Your Hard Drives and Media

By using best practices to store your hard drives and media set for destruction correctly, you keep your customer’s information safe and remain in compliance, but it can be a daunting task. Not so for the team at Crown Information Management. We work with you to establish a storage and destruction schedule, ensuring all your media is safe. Once your hard drives are ready to be destroyed, we will eradicate the hard drives and media with our state-of-the-art, commercial-grade shredder. There won’t be any data left to put back together when we are done, and we will give you a certificate of destruction for your records. We can handle a variety of storage and destruction needs to fit your requirements. Are you ready to stay in compliance and thwart cyber criminals’ evil attempts? Give us a call today and experience the ease of working with us! 

For experienced help with document storage, media destruction, and records management, call Crown Information Management. You can reach us at 800-979-9545 or contact us online to learn more about our services. Put our team to work for you. We are a SOC1 Report,NAID AAA, and PCI Certified company.