Open Sesame… Your Printer Hard Drive!

Open Sesame… Your Printer Hard Drive!

Many companies today choose to lease multi-function printers as a smart way to offset capital expenditures and keep equipment current.  You may be one of them!

Whether or not you lease your printer, before getting rid of it, think again!

The printer may not be the only thing you are giving away… AND, it doesn’t take a professional magician to pull off this magic trick!

There are many risks involved with printing, scanning and copying.  Every time you print a job, send a fax, or scan a document, a copy of that document is stored on the device’s hard drive.  When your lease is up, you’ll be returning the printer to the vendor or dealer to receive a new one.  This is a common scenario.  Now you see it, now you don’t and just like that your data is gone and open to the world of refurbished equipment.  Don’t let this happen to your organization!  It is your responsibility that the data on the printer hard drive never leaves your office.

With the growing number of cyber threats and increased legislation around privacy and data security, organizations are taking necessary steps to protect and secure their network from cyberattacks.  Often overlooked, your printer’s hard drive holds a treasure trove for hackers.

Some of you may remember the days when most document theft was considered to be the office snoop.  You know the person who walked up to the printer and picked up confidential papers that someone else printed.  Today, security is a bit more complicated though.  Like pulling a rabbit out of a hat, your printer’s hard drive holds a multitude of sensitive documents and information and is equally critical to your overall security.

Most businesses don’t think about what to do with their printer’s hard drive until it’s time to decommission them.

Chances are if you lease your printers, you know your vendor.  This should help to take the guesswork out of your printer’s hard drive security.  To avoid last-minute scrambling, it is essential that details are discussed upfront on how the hard drives will be handled at the end of your lease.

Travis Carpenter, Sr. Account Executive, of Electronic Office Systems in Fairfield states:

When it comes to data being stored on copier hard drives and their security, there are many ways businesses can protect themselves from a breach.  The one that's best for your business will boil down to two things—the level of security needed and budget.  Some of our devices have hard drive overwrite capabilities right out of the box and are encrypted.  If not, these options can be added.  In addition, we can swap an old hard drive with a new one before sending it back to the leasing company.  We then give our client their old one.  For ultra-sensitive environments, such as the department of defense, some of our devices have optional "hot swap" hard drives where the hard drive can be removed in a few quick and easy steps for storage under lock and key or to be replaced immediately.

Printer security is becoming an increasingly important issue for businesses today.  Hackers today have more tricks up their sleeves than the average magician.

Feeling uncertain about your company’s security?  Give IT Radix a call today; because once your data is gone, it will take more than a bit of hocus pocus to get it back!

First published in our November 2017 IT Radix Resource newsletter