SoylentNews is people
SoylentNews
https://www.theregister.com/2024/02/07/failed_usb_sticks/
The report, from German data recovery company CBL, concluded that NAND chips from reputable manufacturers such as Hynix, Sandisk, or Samsung that had failed quality control were being resold and repurposed. While still working, the chips' storage capacity is reduced.
"When we opened defective USB sticks last year, we found an alarming number of inferior memory chips with reduced capacity and the manufacturer's logo removed from the chip. Clearly discarded and unrecognizable microSD cards are also soldered onto a USB stick and managed with the external one on the USB stick board instead of the microSD's internal controller," explains Conrad Heinicke, Managing Director of CBL Datenrettung GmbH.
[...] Technological advancements have also affected these NAND chips, but not in a good way. The chips originally used single-level cell (SLC) memory cells that only stored one bit each, offering less data density but better performance and reliability. In order to increase the amount of storage the chips offered, manufacturers started moving to four bits per cell (QLC), decreasing the endurance and retention. Combined with the questionable components, it's why CBL warns that "You shouldn't rely too much on the reliability of flash memory."
[...] It's always wise to be careful when choosing your storage device and beware of offers that seem too good to be true. Back in 2022, a generic 30TB M.2 external SSD was available for about $18 on Walmart's website. It actually held two 512MB SD cards stuck to the board with hot glue – their firmware had been modified to report each one as 15 TB. There was also the case of fake Samsung SSDs with unbelievable slow speeds uncovered last year.
(Score: 4, Interesting) by VLM on Thursday February 08 2024, @02:48PM (7 children)
If the drive is still operational and the firmware is not buggy and you trust the mfgr (why?) then you can send a ATA Secure Erase command which is supposed to wipe all the cells back to factory default.
It doesn't work, plenty of "black hat" paper and conference videos about nobody bothering to implement that correctly.
https://archive.kernel.org/oldwiki/ata.wiki.kernel.org/index.php/ATA_Secure_Erase.html [kernel.org]
Don't know why the wiki page above is now obsolete. Perhaps because nobody implements this feature correctly.
Generally speaking you're better off tossing the SSD thru a shredder or incineration. Difficult for "large" 2.5 inch metal chassis drives, pretty easy for a little M.2 NVMe drive.
(Score: 5, Interesting) by Rosco P. Coltrane on Thursday February 08 2024, @04:19PM (1 child)
That's what angle grinders are for. I've cut up many 5 1/4 with 3 1/2 disks (and cellphones, and old laptops with soldered-on memory) with my 9" angle grinder.
An angle grinder should be part of any computer professional's security tools collection.
(Score: 2) by epitaxial on Friday February 09 2024, @03:21PM
You're not that important and nobody cares what's on your old devices.
(Score: 2, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday February 08 2024, @04:31PM
Aviation snips cost $10 and will take care of a 2.5" metal-chassis SSD in a matter of seconds.
Cut through all the chips at least once if you really want to be sure, but that's probably overkill.
(Score: 1) by shrewdsheep on Thursday February 08 2024, @05:31PM (2 children)
And I thought that flash memory is usually encrypted. Thus a secure erase simply means replacing the encryption key. But that's more anecdotal knowledge.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by turgid on Thursday February 08 2024, @05:44PM (1 child)
Does everyone encrypt their USB sticks?
I refuse to engage in a battle of wits with an unarmed opponent [wikipedia.org].
(Score: 4, Informative) by janrinok on Thursday February 08 2024, @06:22PM
Well it depends on what I am saving on it - but more than half of my USB sticks are encrypted. As you know, a collection of seemingly unimportant files might, in aggregate, be rather more important than first thought.
I have around 10 sticks of different sizes, usually ext3 but I have one that is Windows compatible for those times that there is no other option. I do not have a Windows machine.
I am not interested in knowing who people are or where they live. My interest starts and stops at our servers.
(Score: 5, Interesting) by Unixnut on Thursday February 08 2024, @09:40PM
I just lob them in a microwave for 5 seconds. Fries all the silicon evenly, and if you keep in there longer it will fry the chips properly (as in you get much magic smoke out of them). Good luck to being able to recover anything from that.