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ToZr

Member

Registered: 2022-09-10

Posts: 1

How to wipe out data on a USB drive that is faulty, so that data can't

I bought 3 USB flash drives with 256 GB capacity in 2 different stores in the same city named Murska Sobota, in country Slovenia, during different periods of time. The USB drives were: Hama 256 GB and later I bought a USB key named just Müller 256 GB, both bought in a store named Müller and then I also bought Xplore 256 GB in a store named Big Bang. All USB drives had pretty much the same problems. They all stopped working after a short time, after I copied some data on them. The stores and/or their factories at least steal money, but very likely also steal data, because they know people have personal data on their faulty USB drives. Most customers won't return USB drives, because they are afraid their data will be stolen. The store/factory at least steals money. Then, if the customer returns the USB drive, they also steal the customer's data.
Problem is, the USB drives won't allow me to access the data, so I can't format the drive, I can't wipe out data and I can't copy or delete data, but the data is still there. I checked the data being there with many programs and computers in both Linux and Windows. I also tried to format, delete, copy and wipe out data in both Linux and Windows. I don't have access to it. Many times I get input/output errors, which errors I think are hardware built by the factory, which they can probably bypass with some of their own hardware. Somebody in a store or factory, who produced those faulty USB drives probably has physical access to data. It needs to be said that I have more than 20 USB drives, also Hama 32 GB and Xplore 128 GB, which two USB drives work and many others work for very long. So the problems are always with these 256 GB ones. I assume also that store Müller renamed the old Hama 256 GB into Müller 256 GB, to continue to sell these faulty USB drives, since even in Wikipedia they mentioned scandal around Hama company: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hama_(company). Even the employee in Müller store told me I should look for different and better USB drives in exchange for mine when I tried to buy the more expensive 256 GB one, so everybody knows that the management is pulling a scam, but I needed 256 GB, so I bought it.
My question is, how to wipe out data on a USB drive, so not even recovery program can recover it, so then I can return the USB drive and get my money back? I don't care, if I have to electrocute it with electricity, as long as it stays visually intact, since these companies/stores/factories obviously also sell only visually good, but faulty scammy things.

dogknowsnx

Guest

Re: How to wipe out data on a USB drive that is faulty, so that data can't

No mention of electrocution and such, but:
https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/Securely_wipe_disk

seth

Member

From: Won't reply 2 private help req

Registered: 2012-09-03

Posts: 76,486

Re: How to wipe out data on a USB drive that is faulty, so that data can't

NAND is borderline indestructible.

Problem is, the USB drives won't allow me to access the data, so I can't format the drive, I can't wipe out data and I can't copy or delete data, but the data is still there. I checked the data being there with many programs and computers in both Linux and Windows. I also tried to format, delete, copy and wipe out data in both Linux and Windows. I don't have access to it.

As long as you can write to it, you can overwrite the cells and at some point will have cleared them all, but writing is what stops to work and that makes the memory unusable. Reading otoh will continue to function.
You can fuse the controller, and that is the primary way for new-ish NAND based memory to go down, but the actual data is still there and can (unless there's HW encryption) be recovered.

You can forget about a microwave (which is very good at killing magnetic and optical disks, latter by melting them into a nice bundle. Don't use the thing you use to heat up your food, though) and electrocution will most likely just fry the controller.
Likewise saltwater will reliably kill the controller very fast, but not the memory itself.

hammering it w/ iononizing radiation would be your best shot at killing it, but is probably going to be a very practical issue.

Ftr

In early 2008, over 30,000 flash drives built by a fraudulent Chinese supplier were distributed by Hama.

I'm not even sure there were any 256GB flash drives in 2008…

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