A major secure data destruction client in downtown Manhattan has had their desktop technical support center in the second subbasement of their building completely submerged under 15’ of polluted water. They know that they have hard drives installed in several thousand desktops and laptops that have been completely ruined by the flood. The entire subbasement must be gutted, cleaned and rebuilt. The computers are caked in greasy mud and potentially contaminated. For security and data privacy reasons the hard drives must be removed, sanitized and accounted for and the computers must be recycled according to environmental regulations. We are contacted by the firm’s data security manager asking for our help. Within 24 hours we have a detailed plan of action submitted. The plan is accepted and two days later at 6:00AM we have 6 members of our on-site team deployed in hazmat suits, respirators and with appropriate packaging materials. In two days we recover over three thousand devices, sort them into data assets and non data assets, securely package the devices onto pallets and utilizing rented forklifts remove seven truck loads of equipment. The client’s security manager follows the last truck and confirms our receipt of all the secured pallets. We are now are in the process of cleaning, disinfecting and inventoring the individual items of equipment before they are disassembled for recycling and the hard drives removed and destroyed.
This client had never used our electronic recycling capabilities when disposing of their surplus computer equipment but rather focused on the economics associated to the resale of their used computer equipment. Our status as a licensed electronic recycling facility combined with our on-site team’s capability to quickly and efficiently identify and package technology assets and comprehensive knowledge of chain of custody protocols allowed us to successfully address a major customer disaster.
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