Forum Discussion
[Community tips] How do you manage the removal of devices at the end of their life at your company?
As a reseller we assist a lot with these kind of questions. Its interesting to see what customers decide to do:
- Use trade-in options
- Donations
- Handing out to employees
- Offering employees to buy there work phone
- Put them in storage and forget about them.
No matter what option they pick, I always make sure to point out the importance of wiping a device. Samsung has a certification that says that a MDM wipe is making sure that all data is removed, but not all vendors have these kind of certificates. Besides that, as a company you don't get any confirmation about it. Which makes it difficult to prove that devices have been wiped in case you need it.
I always advice to perform a certified wipe before getting rid of device. Its quick, easy and it gives you some peace of mind that corporate data is actually removed.
Thank Michel for your response. Yeah, you mention options here that I hadn't even thought about. 😀 It would be super interesting to hear what options are the most popular and I suppose sometimes it could be a combination of options depending on the devices.
Your point on security is a crucial one here. Regarding your point about hearing when a device has been wiped, do you think something could be implemented to help this? Do you think it would be useful?
Trade-in is by far the most populair one, reducing the cost for new devices beats going a sustainable route (but even with trade-in, customers demand a sustainable proces)
I think such a certification that Samsung has should be the standard for all devices, a wipe initiated from a factory reset or trough MDM should always wipe all data.
But getting a certificate that proofs it is wiped can only be generated trough 3rd party software in my opinion. There is a dutch saying: You can't be the butcher who inspects his own meat. Meaning: If the butcher says its meat is safe but it hasn't been checked by someone else (the authorities ), can you really be sure that it is safe?
