CompTIA CySA+ Practice Test

Which method effectively eliminates recoverable information from drives during the data sanitization process?

1. Cryptographic erasure

2. Data clearing

3. Physical destruction

4. Full disk formatting

The correct answer is: Cryptographic erasure

Cryptographic erasure is an effective method for eliminating recoverable information from drives during the data sanitization process because it involves encrypting the data on the drive with a strong encryption algorithm and then deleting the encryption keys. Since the data itself remains on the drive but is rendered inaccessible without the keys, it is essentially impossible to recover the original information without those keys. This process is efficient and can be performed relatively quickly compared to physical destruction methods, making it a preferred choice when the drive will still be used but needs to be sanitized. Other methods, like data clearing, typically overwrite the data but may leave remnants that could potentially be recovered with advanced techniques. Physical destruction is very effective, but it renders the drive unusable. Full disk formatting does not secure the data in a way that makes it unrecoverable; instead, it often simply removes pointers to the data rather than the data itself. Therefore, cryptographic erasure stands out as the most effective method for ensuring that recoverable information is eliminated from drives.