Camera Craniums: The Photography Community for Enthusiasts

Take a look at this link:-
http://www.wimp.com/copymachines/

Worrying. I confess I thought it was a spoof at first but it seems like a genuine risk.

That is absolutely mind boggleling. Particularly for me. I was not aware there were hard drives in those machines, I went to night school a couple of years back to learn to be an A+ Certified technician and while we spent a few hours leaning about servicing a photocopier, not once did anyone, particularly the instructor mention they were there.

This is rather worrying - given a need for employers to take copies of birth certificates and/ or passports etc.

I suspect that in the UK - not clearing the data would be a breach of the Data Protection Act but it would be nice to find out!

WTF????

The manufacturers put a hard drive in that totally isn't necessary and then complain that people don't pay an extra $500 for their "special software" to erase data that should never have been stored?

Either this is a hoax or just one brand - I can't believe everyone is currently using hard drives in copiers.  I can see a need for about 2 - 3 GB of storage for complex copiers.  In 1992 maybe a sensible way of doing that was putting a small hard drive in (all hard drives were small in '92). But it's now a lot more cost effective and lower maintenance to use flash memory for that.

The only bright spot is that they used forensic recovery s/w to get the data off.  That implies that at least the manus are erasing the data.  But of course they would because the drive would fill up.

Tell you what.  If I worked in an office I'd be taking a screwdriver to the copier today......

having shown the wife - she thinks it makes sense given the copiers her company had.

All copiers were document copiers printers with an independent recall facility - independent of the network.
They were printing and binding documents of up to 150 pages and up to A3 in size with an ability to recall for up to 3 months with ease.

Your flash memory is not going to fulfill that criteria! H/D would.

I have no issue the copiers having the H/D's - but i'd have an issue with them not being wiped on sale or redistribution...

I can't help thinking that legislation in the UK would make this an unacceptable action.

Quote from: Jonathan on May 19, 2010, 07:57:46 AM
WTF????

The manufacturers put a hard drive in that totally isn't necessary and then complain that people don't pay an extra $500 for their "special software" to erase data that should never have been stored?

Either this is a hoax or just one brand - I can't believe everyone is currently using hard drives in copiers.  I can see a need for about 2 - 3 GB of storage for complex copiers.  In 1992 maybe a sensible way of doing that was putting a small hard drive in (all hard drives were small in '92). But it's now a lot more cost effective and lower maintenance to use flash memory for that.

The only bright spot is that they used forensic recovery s/w to get the data off.  That implies that at least the manus are erasing the data.  But of course they would because the drive would fill up.

Tell you what.  If I worked in an office I'd be taking a screwdriver to the copier today......

I don't see it being a hoax, that disclosure about Buffalo Police is probably getting lawyers all primed up for lawsuits even as we speak. And what that suggests to me is that the harddrive installation was completely left out of any of the equipment brochures.  As for the forensic recovery, did the report not state that software was available off the internet for free?