For IEEE 2883-compliant Data Sanitization, Turn to Blancco Drive Eraser

The most robust data sanitization standard to date, IEEE-2883, went live August 17, 2022. Here’s how to be certain your enterprise or ITAD is sanitizing storage media to this new standard.

In this post:

• There’s a new standard in town: IEEE 2883-2022. Are you compliant?
• Blancco Drive Eraser achieves ADISA IEEE-2883 Product Assurance Certification
• Benefits of IEEE-2883-compliant data sanitization
• Why does ADISA Product Assurance Certification matter for IEEE-2883 compliance?
• What makes IEEE 2883-2022 different from NIST 800-88?
• Why your organization can rely on Blancco for IEEE-compliant data sanitization
• Do you need IEEE-compliant data sanitization?

Vivian Cullipher Vivian is a career writer and editor, having covered technology-related topics for government and B2B organizations since before LinkedIn and the iPhone. As Blancco’s head of content, she oversees the development of thought-leadership-based copy for web, social media, and other Blancco communication channels.

There’s a new standard in town: IEEE 2883-2022. Are you compliant? 

The IEEE Standards Association has issued a new global data sanitization standard: the IEEE Standard for Sanitizing Storage.

This standard gets into the specifics on how to remove data from modern storage technologies. With those specifics comes certainty. And that certainty means there’s a greater opportunity to reuse and recycle even your most advanced IT assets.

With data use and storage skyrocketing and data storage technologies accommodating that data use, this is good news. That’s because NIST SP 800-88 Rev. 1, Media Sanitization Guidelines—perhaps the world’s most well-known reference for data sanitization—was last updated in 2014. That was nearly 10 years ago.

Though it was intended to be “evergreen,” the gap is widening between what NIST covered then and what top businesses use now for advanced data storage and processing.

With a fresh approach and updates planned for every five years, IEEE 2883-compliant data sanitization provides businesses with the confidence that as technology continues to advance, they can securely reuse the drives and devices they’ve invested in—and support the circular economy.

So how can enterprises and IT asset disposition (ITAD) organizations be sure they’re getting IEEE 2883-compliant data sanitization?

The surest way to meet IEEE-2883 Clear and Purge levels of sanitization is to work with a solution tested and proven to meet those guidelines. In this case, that means passing evaluations by one of the world’s foremost data sanitization certification organizations, ADISA Certification, Ltd.

Blancco Drive Eraser achieves ADISA IEEE-2883 Product Assurance Certification

We’re glad to announce our flagship product, Blancco Drive Eraser, is now ADISA Certified to Product Assurance (View Certificate) for IEEE 2883 Clear and Purge levels of data sanitization.

Other data sanitization software companies may state that they erase to this standard, but the ADISA Product Assurance Certification scheme is the only independent assessment that verifies IEEE 2883 compliance.

Why is this important?

The IEEE 2883 standard provides “technology-specific requirements and guidance for the elimination of recorded data.” These requirements are for the advanced data storage drives that enterprises are relying on now, not those developed a decade ago.

Benefits of IEEE-2883-compliant data sanitization

Certified data sanitization eradicates data completely and permanently, making sure that data is beyond recovery. It provides data security for the organization, lowers risk, and ensures compliance with an ever-increasing number of data protection and privacy regulations. After all, data can’t be stolen from used drives or devices if it can’t be accessed.

Unlike physical destruction, software-based IEEE 2883 data sanitization leaves functional drives and devices intact. This provides an environmentally sustainable option for IT asset disposal, recycling, or reuse. In other words:

• Fewer devices head to landfill.
• Fewer natural resources are mined when functional devices already exist.

With IEEE 2883 Clear and Purge data erasure, you can confidently redeploy your functional data storage media. Rather than cut your technology investment short, you can safely reuse those assets within your organization, return them to the manufacturer, or donate or sell them elsewhere. You don’t have to worry whether any data remains after devices leave your care.

But your erasure software must be able to execute erasure to the standards you choose. For newer, more advanced storage systems, erasing to IEEE 2883 Purge level is a solid choice.

And for IEEE-compliant sanitization, Blancco Drive Eraser is certified to do the job.

Why does ADISA Product Assurance Certification matter for IEEE-2883 compliance?

“The ADISA Product Assurance 2023 certification scheme assesses compliance with known data sanitization guidelines and standards. This is achieved through rigorous testing to verify the commands which the software sends to different media types and interfaces.”

ADISA Research Centre website

The IEEE Certification from ADISA requires passing multiple tests to achieve Product Assurance. And ADISA tested Blancco Drive Eraser on multiple drive types for IEEE-compliant data sanitization.

ADISA Product Assurance Certification verifies the performance of data erasure software —and therefore, provides assurance to those who use it. In this case, Blancco Drive Eraser has been proven capable of erasing data to the Clear and Purge levels specified under IEEE 2883-2022, a status described as “IEEE Compliance Verified.”

What makes IEEE 2883-2022 different from NIST 800-88?

But there’s still the question of why anyone should adopt the IEEE standard over NIST 800‑88.

Eric Hibbard, chair of the IEEE Cybersecurity & Standards Committe, notes that IEEE 2883 “provides detailed guidance and requirements for the proper way of eradicating data on storage devices and media.”

While NIST provides guidelines, IEEE 2883 provides clear steps based on technology type. It lays the groundwork for compliance and conformance by explaining how to securely sanitize data storage technologies such as SATA, SCSI, and NVMe drives that have become more popular the last ten to fifteen years.

That detail is important.

Since the NIST standard provides limited guidance for advanced technologies, IEEE 2883-2022 offers a critical resource for organizations that need to securely remove data from media that might otherwise be challenging to sanitize.

Why your organization can rely on Blancco for IEEE-compliant data sanitization

With more than 25 years of innovation in software-based data erasure, Blancco has a history of addressing data sanitization challenges. This has included:

• Patented SSD data erasure technology
• Quick-to-market solutions for Apple and Chromebook devices
• Automated workflows that enable enterprises and ITADs to scale data sanitization processes for hundreds or even thousands of devices at a time
• Erasure across the widest variety of drive and device types
• Integrations for efficiency and automation for greater assurance and reduced processing costs

After the standard’s release, Blancco’s in-house development team quickly and skillfully integrated IEEE 2883’s Clear and Purge drive sanitization requirements for HDDs and SSDs, making it available for organizations that rely on top-of-the-line technology to conduct business. Now, after extensive testing, those capabilities are certified by one of the most respected standards certification bodies in the world.

Do you need IEEE-compliant data sanitization?

This is a good time to make sure your data sanitization policies are up to date. Read through the standard. Then, when thinking about your decommissioning processes, consider whether IEEE 2883-2022 might be the best sanitization standard for your situation, especially if your organization relies on newer technologies.

If you do choose IEEE 2883 Clear or Purge for your next asset decommissioning project, contact us about Blancco Drive Eraser. We’ll gladly show you how it executes IEEE-compliant data sanitization across your various data storage drives.

(Incidentally, you may not be quite ready to adopt this new standard. That’s okay. Blancco Drive Eraser is also ADISA certified for NIST 800-88. Whichever standard you prefer, we’re ready and able to assist.)

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