Picking Up the Pieces

ravenousbugblatter writes "The New York Times online ran an article yesterday titled Picking up the pieces that talks about new technology that can recover information from shredded documents. Not only can companies scan strip-shredded paper and recover the information, they can do the same with cross-shredded paper. It comes at a price though - one company charges $8,000-$10,000 to "reconstruct" the information in a cubic foot of cross-shredded material. How's it done? The shreds are glued onto a piece of paper and then scanned. Software then looks for matches (in one case using the pattern of ink at the edges of the pieces) and suggests possible combinations to the operator that can be accepted or rejected."

Comments

First

[Nerdimus_Maximus]

Sure beats putting them back together by hand. Could have saved alot of dumpster-diving as a teen...

Re:First

[Bigby]

I'm surprised this company hasn't been sued for violating the DMCA because they are attempting to "circumvent a security feature".

Shredding is for wimps.

[Anonymous Coward]

That's why I always dissolve my old paper in concentrated sulfuric acid.

Re:Shredding is for wimps.

[vasqzr]

I eat my shredded paper in a bowl with milk.

mmmm, fiber

Re:Shredding is for wimps.

[BlackHawk-666]

We all do that, but most of us do it in prepackaged boxes bought at the supermarket labelled "breakfast cereal" or "shredded wheat" ;-0

Re:Shredding is for wimps.

[los furtive]

In the Canadian Forces it was regular practice in the field to simply burn any document that had a classicifaction higher than Protected A (pretty much Confidential and above). I've had to do it more than once. Of course, burning isn't enough, you then need to pulverise the ashes since you can often still read from the burnt paper.

It wouldn't phase me it we found out the NSA has a method of determining the contents of a document by reading the smoke that is generated as it burns ;-)

Re:Shredding is for wimps.

[hesiod]

> an article yesterday titled Picking up the Lumps

Hmm. Wouldn't that be "Picking up the Dumps?

Re:Shredding is for wimps.

[VikingBerserker]

Actually, we in the intelligence community prefer to scan the target's cerebellum as he/she is in the process of reading the document. Not only do we get the document in question, but we also learn its pertinence at the same time. Once in a while we get a bonus, like a nice new recipe for Poutine.

Re:Shredding is for wimps.

[mark_lybarger]

Please, tell me you're joking. Canada has forces? Stronger than snow and wind?

Re:Shredding is for wimps.

[Anonymous Coward]

I eat my shredded paper in a bowl with milk.

After disolving it into concentrated sulfuric acid?

If people only knew...

[creative_name]

...they were shelling out $8,000-$10,000 for some dude to sit in a room with a couple of cases of crazy glue and a knack for deciphering ink blots...

Crap! my secret's out.

DOes this violate the DCMCA?

[Unknown Poltroon]

I mean, isnt shredding a type of encrypton? And isnt this reverse engineering?

I think ive mispelled every word in here.

Re:DOes this violate the DCMCA?

[fwr]

That, itself, is a form of encryption. So, anyone who attempts to understand your post, with its spelling mistakes and all, is violating the DMCMACMACA... The methodology would be using your brain and common sense logic, so please report to the nearest brain-wiping center promptly.

Impressive

[jhines0042]

But I guess thats why the government always burns sensitive papers.

Although... I remembering hearing about a set of government instructions that once said:

1) Destroy all copies of this document once you have read it.
2) But make a copy first for your records.

Re:Impressive

[Evro]

Yes, I have seen most of a burned document recovered using chemical and laser analysis of the charred remnants.

I saw MacGuyver do this once and he didn't need any stinking laser beams... I forgot how he supposedly did it, but it sure was cool.

Any word on..

[AndyRooney]

..how much they charge for putting together the pieces of my broken career? Andy Rooney

Re:Simple workaround.

[bourne]

Or you could flush it down the toilet after you tear 'em up.

DO NOT TRY THIS.

I tried to do this with a teacher's note when I was in 4th grade or so. The ripped up little pieces floated happily around and never flushed.

Maybe it will work with a powerful industrial-strength "sounds-like-an-airplane-taking-off" mechanism but, if you're working with a standard home toilet, you're unlikely to get the results you wanted.

Quality Control

[randmairs]

You know they'll have a way to go when they put back the pieces from a New York Deli reciept reading: "2 Kosher ham and cheese on Rye. manZlick"

Re:Fire is cheaper

[tag]

And you get your red Swingline back, too.

Memory holes.

[rice_burners_suck]

For this reason, I don't throw away shredded papers. I had memory holes installed in my home, a la 1984, and whenever I throw away a paper, all I do is throw it in the memory hole and a vacuum sucks it away and into a furnace that burns the paper until it nothing but dust. I mix it with dirt, soil and fertilizer, and then I spread it all over my yard. The plants love it.

Document FLAMER!

[WPIDalamar]

Excellent! Since shredding isn't secure anymore, when are we going to get personal paper INCINERATORS. Put paper in... press button... KAZAAM, 4 foot flames shoot out of the bin.

In related news...

[chad_r]

... Arthur Andersen accountants and Enron executives were reported to have pooped their pants upon hearing this.

Re:Diced documents?

[FattMattP]

I wonder how long it will be before we see the first shredders that slice the documents into squares instead of long strips.

It'll be about 20 years ago. At least.

Re:This is why

[Cpt_Kirks]

For the explosion? I once saw an idiot 2Lt dump a box of 1x2mm document shreds into a blazing burn barrel.

Tiny bits of paper + oxygen + hot flame = Lots of fun (if you're not too close).

Burn it.

[TheLink]

Make sure it's burnt thoroughly then stir the ashes and flush em.

That should work.

For harddisks, I hear thermite, some pots and a big bucket of sand works - the bucket of sand is to stop the molten stuff from going through the drive, the bucket and the floor.

Re:I burn my shreds!

[Thuktun]

Burn Baby Burn! That way, I can be sure no one goes through my secrets, muha!

This sounds like a cue for an Onion article about a new technique for reconstituting paper from capured smoke.

Re:Still a good idea...

[Cyno]

I'm not paranoid enough to shred my financial documents. But I'll happily encrypt all my data.

I don't trust you. Its not that I don't trust some criminal who might be after my money. I don't trust YOU. My neighbor, my friend, my fellow citizen. Because I watched you vote.

Re:When I was...

[Salgak1]

I was in the USAF as well. We also had the "powdering" shredder, but OUR SOP was to shred docs, place in the black plastic bag, stop by the Field Maintenance Squadron, sign for a 1-2 gallon container of JP-4, then call Civil Engineering and the Security Police Squadron. We'd all meet at a remote location on base, I'd empty the bags into a steel drum, followed by the JP-4, CE would throw in a radio-controlled incediary thingie, and we'd all retreat 50 yards or so, the cop would make a radio call, and the CE guy pressed the trigger. Big fireball, pillar of flame for 5 minutes, and then walk back up, stir the ash, another gallon of JP-4, and repeat.

I don't even want to THINK what they had to do with the TOP SECRET and Compartmented waste. . .

Don't flush paper towels either!

[Anonymous Coward]

Or you could flush it down the toilet after you tear 'em up.

I tried to do this with a teacher's note when I was in 4th grade or so. The ripped up little pieces floated happily around and never flushed.

The same thing holds true for paper towels that you've used to catch some, um, sticky messes. After a bout of porn watching on my roomates' computer, I decided to simply flush the residual evidence down the toilet. Well, you guessed it, the damn thing wouldn't go down. Then I had to explain to my roomate why on earth I tried to flush a folded-up paper towel down the toilet. Eventually I had to fish it out of there -- ugh!

Be smart: use Kleenex instead for those types of situations. Paper towels are sturdier but harder to get rid of!

P.S.: I realize this is off-topic but I figured that this is handy (no pun intended) information for slashdotters!

Re:When I was...

[JUSTONEMORELATTE]

I was in the USAF as well. We also had the "powdering" shredder, but OUR SOP was to shred docs, place in the black plastic bag, stop by the Field Maintenance Squadron, sign for a 1-2 gallon container of JP-4, then call Civil Engineering and the Security Police Squadron. We'd all meet at a remote location on base, I'd empty the bags into a steel drum, followed by the JP-4, CE would throw in a radio-controlled incediary thingie, and we'd all retreat 50 yards or so, the cop would make a radio call, and the CE guy pressed the trigger. Big fireball, pillar of flame for 5 minutes, and then walk back up, stir the ash, another gallon of JP-4, and repeat.
One has to wonder how much this was dictated by security requirements, and how much is was just because you could.

--

Re:Still a good idea...

[JUSTONEMORELATTE]

It's substantially more effecient to just throw your statements out to the street on trash day under your coffee grinds.
Coffee grinds? Bah! As a parent, I have two words for you:
diaper pail
If someone gets my credit card statement, they damn well deserve it.

--

Re:Still a good idea...

[killmenow]

I don't care about risk analysis. If there's a chance at all, (as others have pointed out) you can get a shredder for ~ 20 USD. I told my aunt to buy me a crosscut shredder for Christmas or something so got it free.

Besides, the cost and the risk are not the point (for me). I just freaking love the feeling I get when I run solicitations through it. Jesus I love that scrunchy crunchy grinding noise it makes.

I swear my blood pressure gets a few points closer to normal every time I shred something. Paper shredders: they do a body good!

Re:Hm... social engineering!

[Anonymous Coward]

What sort of things could you glean from microsoft's trash using one of these programs.

You don't need to spend $8,000 for MS's trash -- Office only costs about $400!

I've got an idea!

[gnarled]

For ultimate security simply shred pages of the printed goatse picture with your other documents. Nobody slowly peicing together you documents would want to stare at that horrible image for that long.

Hats off to Sneakers

[Ridgelift]

It would make for a very boring movie:

Computer: Scanning complete. Attempting to reconstruct document.
Computer: "SETEC ASTRONOMY". Please enter [Y] to accept or [N] to continue

Operator: N

Computer: "MY SOCRATES NOTE". Please enter [Y] to accept or [N] to continue

Operator: N

Computer: "COOTYS RAT SEMEN". Please enter [Y] to accept or [N] to continue

Operator: N

Computer: "TOO MANY SECRETS". Please enter [Y] to accept or [N] to continue

Operator: Okay Mother, I think we've got it.


Uh....naah. It just doesn't do it for me.

$10k to solve jig-saw puzzles??

[jabber01]

I want THAT job!

Re:This is why

[BlackHawk-666]

Was your previous job at Enron by any chance ;->

Re:Who's paranoid?

[PhilHibbs]

What I think would be a good solution would be a shredder with a built-in printer

You mean a shrinter?

This is why

[JohnnyGTO]

I wait a week and send 15 pounds of docs, printed spam and snail mail ads through a tree chipper which is then lit on fire a rolled on the hill to a fast flowing river.

X10 Web Cam in the voting booth?

[duck_prime]

I don't trust you. Its not that I don't trust some criminal who might be after my money. I don't trust YOU. My neighbor, my friend, my fellow citizen. Because I watched you vote.

Well maybe if you'd stop leaning over my shoulder while I vote, I'd stop poking through your trash bin.

For the TOP SECRET stuff...

[devphil]

I also work in a USAF research lab. Powdering shredders are cool, but only permitted for low level stuff.

I don't even want to THINK what they had to do with the TOP SECRET and Compartmented waste. . .

Antimatter.