Will HP wipe my hard drive?

[asadcat]

Hi, I’m not sure where to post this question but:

I recently sent my laptop in for repairs, backed up my data, but didn’t do a factory reset since I expected to get it back. There was an unexpected delay that put my repair time back 2 months so HP offered to buy back my laptop. My pictures and documents are still on that hard drive. What is the process that HP goes through to ensure my data is completely wiped from the system? Should I be worried about my stuff leaking?

[WAWood]

@asadcat 

We do not know what HP is going to do with your drive -- but my guess is that they are NOT going to WIPE it -- because this requires special software and takes HOURS to do.  I can not see them investing that much time.  More likely, they will simply render the drive useless -- as hitting it with a sledge hammer will do that.

If you were worried about sensitive information, you should have either removed the drive before you sent it in, or if that could not be done easily, have come here and we could have point out some free apps you could have used to actually WIPE the drive of personal information.

[asadcat]

Thank you for the reply! I removed my passwords and banking info but really didn’t expect to never get my laptop back so left my pictures on there )’: 

[WAWood]

@asadcat 

OK, understand ... but we have no information regarding what HP does with used customer drives, and no way to find out.

As I said, my guess is they trash the drives before recycling them.