Why credit unions should take a hammer to their hard drives
by: Matt Wilhelm
As our nation continues its recovery from the lingering effects of recession, credit unions may find themselves with more wiggle room in their budgets than a few years back, and many are looking to upgrade their technology, whether by force or by choice. Windows Small Business Server 2003 is being retired for good in a couple weeks, credit unions are looking at ways to use the cloud, and employees are getting sick of slow running laptops or desktops. So perhaps your CU has begun to look at replacing, or already in the process of replacing old hardware with new technology. What do you do with the old laptops, desktops and servers once all the information is removed and transferred to newer machines? Do you retire them to the technology graveyard closet in your CU… stack them behind the paper towels? Are you a good citizen to mother earth and send them in for recycling?
Destroy them!
That’s right. Obliterate them… physically. As it turns out, there is a time and a place for the physical decimation of a hard drive. Especially one that has member sensitive data on it. If you don’t feel like venting your own frustration with a hammer to the hard drive, there are services available that offer hard drive destruction, that come with a certificate of destruction.
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