Hard Drive Data Exposure Prevention Methods

Preventing Data Exposure from Dumpster Diving

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Question

A dumpster diver recovers several hard drives from a company and is able to obtain confidential data from one of the hard drives.

The company then discovers its information is posted online.

Which of the following methods would have MOST likely prevented the data from being exposed?

Answers

Explanations

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A. B. C. D.

D.

The most likely method that would have prevented the data from being exposed in this scenario is option C, using Blowfish encryption on the hard drives.

Dumpster diving is a method used by attackers to obtain sensitive information by going through discarded materials such as hard drives, documents, and other storage devices. In this scenario, the attacker was able to obtain confidential data from one of the hard drives that they recovered.

Option A, removing the hard drive from its enclosure, would not have prevented the data from being exposed. If the data on the hard drive was not encrypted, then the attacker would still be able to access it.

Option B, using software to repeatedly rewrite over the disk space, may be effective in preventing data recovery, but it is not a guaranteed method. Advanced data recovery techniques may still be able to recover some of the data.

Option D, using magnetic fields to erase the data, may be effective in erasing data from hard drives, but it requires specialized equipment and expertise. It is not a practical solution for most organizations.

Option C, using Blowfish encryption on the hard drives, is the most effective solution for preventing the data from being exposed. Encryption is the process of encoding data in a way that only authorized parties can access it. Blowfish encryption is a strong encryption algorithm that can provide high levels of security for sensitive data. Even if the attacker was able to obtain the encrypted data, they would not be able to access it without the encryption key.

In summary, the most effective method to prevent data exposure in this scenario is to use encryption, such as Blowfish, on the hard drives.