HIPAA Compliant Hard Drive Destruction

destroyed hard drive

Information protection laws such as HIPPA (Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996) apply to hard drive destruction and the destruction of their hard-copy counterparts. To enforce these security laws, costly fines are associated with any violations. For example, HIPPA Noncompliance penalties are $100-$50,000 per violation. Affinity Health Plan paid a $1.2 million fine in 2010 because the hard drives in their copiers contained protected health information and other sensitive documents.

It’s More Than Just Hard Drives

Hard drive destruction is about more than just the typical computer hard drives you think of. There are hard drives in phones, copiers, memory cards and more. Any electronic device that is used to store personally identifiable information or protected health information needs to be securely destroyed. Below is a list of items that often fall under the category:

  • Hard drives across devices (solid state/rotational/magnetic)
  • USBs or flash drives
  • Zip or floppy disks
  • SCSI drives
  • Magnetic tapes
  • Audio visual media (CDs/DVDs/VHS tapes/cassette tapes)
  • CPUs
  • Mobile devices (cell phones/tablets/laptops/PDAs)
  • Gaming systems
  • Televisions
  • Credit and debit cards
  • X-rays
  • Badges
  • Microfilm and microfiche
  • Backup tapes
  • RAM and ROM-based storage
  • Biomedical devices (infusion pumps/MRI and CT machines/ventilators/ultrasound devices)
  • Any system or device that at any time contained private information

How Do Hard Drive Destruction Services Work?

HIPAA and other privacy and security rules do not require specific hard drive disposal methods. However, they have a list of what is “reasonable” to safeguard confidential information. Any media containing personally identifiable information needs to be rendered “unusable and/or inaccessible”.

At ConfiData, our hard drive destruction process is very simple:

  1. Fill out our contact form or give us a call at 1-800-627-4733 to get free hard drive shredding services quotes.
  2. Rob Shauger our Director of Sales & Development will reach out to discuss your shredding needs and map out a destruction service that meets your budget and needs.
  3. Hard drive destruction professionals will pick up your materials and devices or you can ship/drop them off at our secure shredding facility.
  4. Once all hard drives and media are collected, they are destroyed.
  5. After the hard drive shredding and destruction is complete, you will receive a certificate of destruction. This certificate guarantees the use of best practices and compliance with HIPAA and FACTA.

Want to learn more about our hard drive shredding services? Check out our Hard Drive Destruction page, or contact us for more information.