Are there any methods to erase a single-write disc in an optical disc drive?

[Badstormer]

Writing over a single-use disc that's already been written to strikes me as a relatively simple way to destroy the data on it for most practical purposes, but I can't seem to find any method - at all - to write twice to a single-use disc even if data destruction is the goal.

Is my logic correct that simply burning the entire data side of a single-use disc would render most forms of data unusable, and, if so, are there any methods to do this in a conventional disc drive? I'm actually impressed how difficult it is to accomplish this compared to how easy it is to, even accidentally, destroy other mediums for data storage.

edit: specifically asking for methods to convince a disk drive to write over a finalized, non-rewritable disc, not for the purpose of reuse but rather data removal that doesn't involve physically damaging the disc

[Crashed]

Ursprungligen skrivet av d¢:

You could also take a blowtorch to it

I think that'll be sufficient.

OP doesn't want toxic fumes.

[emoticorpse]

Ursprungligen skrivet av Badstormer:

Ursprungligen skrivet av emoticorpse:

Well, I agree that's an acceptable way for most people to dispose of them but seems like OP still needs a step further considering all the other things wasn't good enough.

The point of my original question wasn't actually for data destruction methods, but rather to see if a method to erase a single-use disc with regular tools was ever even possible. It just struck me as unusual that there wasn't a way to erase a disc without using destructive methods.

edit: that being said, I posit that re-burning the whole disc in a manner that actually alters the data directly is a much more secure data erasure method than just breaking the thing or scratching parts of it, considering someone with enough time and money could realistically reassemble it if the data itself hasn't been altered. Using a microwave or lighter would probably be the next most effective method if you don't mind inhaling plastic fumes.

I get what you're saying, and what puzzles me is what exactly surprises you about things being the way they are.

AS FAR AS I KNOW, Even HDD's don't have a built-in way to destroy the data. I understand you can do a full format setting all bits to zero or whatever, but apparently the data is still possibly retrievable, so by your standard of "true built in data destruction" this doesn't count and it's not technically destroying the data. Even writing over once isn't enough apparently if standard procedure is to do multiple passes at least. This also isn't even a "de facto the data is gone" thing. This is just what people have all agreed is sufficient until someone figures out a way to beat that. The supposed secure way is to do the full format and apparently that wasn't enough so the "multiple pass" thing was implemented. You can just overwrite it over and over and over using other methods but still technically are outside options of the functionality of the drive itself. That's not technically destroying the data and what's even more interesting about that is that they're not "write once".

So, I would think your question if anything would be applicable to HDD's and probably a lot of forms of data storage the way it's presented. Especially SSD"s, becuase from what I hear they a limited amount of writes? So what happens after that last write has been reached? Can the bit be changed on the drive? if not then what happens? If there is a way to erase it after that, I haven't heard of it. Would like to, and I'm not saying it isn't possible. I just never even thought of it really until just now.

Even if discs were not "write once", the best they'd offer is probably a full format just like HDD's and people would realize it's not enough and they'd have to do take extra measures which would not meet your requirement of "built in way" of destroying the data.

scratching or breaking the CD I would say is the equivalent of DBAN or bleachbit multi-pass wipe. Only reason people don't break hdd's and hardware is because that probably isn't worth the effort and the drive is re-usable otherwise they'd probably crack it in half like a cd and it still wouldn't meet your definition of "built in way to destroy data".

Since you haven't even figured out what drive model erased that data like you think (which might be true, I'm not sure) seems hard to be proven that even that method is fully tried and tested to be true "data destruction". Just like anything else, if everybody used those drives someone probably would have figured out a way to dig it back up.

Anyways, All this kind of just poured out of me so if I'm wrong on something obvious my bad.

[Badstormer]

Ursprungligen skrivet av emoticorpse:

-snip-

The question isn't strictly 'true data destruction methods', and more why a disc drive refuses to erase a disc even though it's fully capable of doing so, leaving destructive methods as the only other option. It seems inherently more safe to just wreck up the data with the disk drive's laser than leave a user to their own physical methods for making the disc unusable. In other words, the only thing stopping a user from erasing a single-write disc by writing over it twice is the disk drive's refusal to do so. Nothing is physically stopping the drive's laser from writing over a finalized disc. The point of the original post is finding a way to bypass the firmware limitation that seems to be designed to prevent accidental data loss where the intention is data loss.

[emoticorpse]

Ursprungligen skrivet av Badstormer:

...that seems to be designed to prevent accidental data loss where the intention is data loss.

I think if anything it's more for safety. Some people out there trying to figure out how to melt their drives for no reason whatsoever.

Also, we're moving in circles here. I already covered (whether it was too long for you to read or what I'm not sure) and you're still I think lost in your own thing. You just said "intentional data loss" which like LITERALLY means "destruction of data" except worded differently, but you want to swear you're not talking about "true data destruction" and I guess are look for a half-way attempted way at destroying the data?

Anyways man, I did try do help you out. Good luck in figuring out what you are trying to figure out. I am glad that you did see a post here that seems to have provided closure to your search for that search though.

[Ocelote.12]

Ursprungligen skrivet av _I_:

^ rich people, they have the ability to do anything

Bruce Wayne aka Batman, from the _Justice League_ movie, answering to Flash:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5NG3n_gONws

[HypersleepyNaputunia]

e hammer by asus

i see that it can delete cds and dvds permanently

idk never used it

[emoticorpse]

Ursprungligen skrivet av Megami Blanc:

e hammer by asus

i see that it can delete cds and dvds permanently

idk never used it

This got my interest so I dug around on that program since I've never heard of it. But, doesn't seem to do what OP is looking for.

You'll see what I mean if you read this page https://hackaday.io/project/194199-sustainable-optical-media-data-destruction/log/226265-asus-e-hammer

Apart from that, actual information on hands on experience with that program seems difficult to find.

[HypersleepyNaputunia]

i would just get a nail and scratch top and bottom

anyone that determined is nsa or something

[Badstormer]

Ursprungligen skrivet av emoticorpse:

Also, we're moving in circles here. I already covered (whether it was too long for you to read or what I'm not sure) and you're still I think lost in your own thing. You just said "intentional data loss" which like LITERALLY means "destruction of data" except worded differently, but you want to swear you're not talking about "true data destruction" and I guess are look for a half-way attempted way at destroying the data?

Anyways man, I did try do help you out. Good luck in figuring out what you are trying to figure out. I am glad that you did see a post here that seems to have provided closure to your search for that search though.

Just to be clear, I'm not trying to look for data destruction methods, and my clarification that the action I'm looking for would result in data loss is just part of the description of what I'm actually looking for.

To put it in the simplest terms I can, I'm looking for an optical disc drive with the ability to erase single-write discs, and I'm searching for this not out of a desire for data destruction it but rather to see if it's ever even been done to begin with. I've yet to find any drive, from any manufacturer, at any point in time, that has ever had the ability to do this, so I wanted to see if anyone ever had done it, as it seemed unusual that not one commercial tool had ever been made for this purpose.

I tried to design the OP around this specific question but 80% of the posts here are basically just saying "why do that when you can just scratch the disc?", when the question was more out of curiosity whether a specific thing exists than about general destruction methods. Including the term "where the intention is data loss" was more to help describe the function in a drive I'm looking for, not to inquire about data destruction in general.

So far, only one post has even referenced a piece of hardware with this ability, but didn't name anything specific. That particular post is pretty much the only thing that has addressed the question I've posed so far. I understand interpreting my question as "how does one erase data from a single-write disc", but that wasn't what I was looking for, and I tried to write the OP in a manner to reduce this interpretation as much as possible.

I do appreciate that people are trying to be helpful here, but I feel like the question is being misunderstood since the function I'm looking for isn't easy to find and isn't often used.

edit: since the thing I'm asking for is something most wouldn't think to even look for, I can understand not being familiar with any tools that match it, but the point of this post is to try to get responses from someone that might be aware of methods matching what I've described. Frankly, I expected it to just get buried without any responses.

[Crashed]

Ursprungligen skrivet av emoticorpse:

Ursprungligen skrivet av Megami Blanc:

e hammer by asus

i see that it can delete cds and dvds permanently

idk never used it

This got my interest so I dug around on that program since I've never heard of it. But, doesn't seem to do what OP is looking for.

You'll see what I mean if you read this page https://hackaday.io/project/194199-sustainable-optical-media-data-destruction/log/226265-asus-e-hammer

Apart from that, actual information on hands on experience with that program seems difficult to find.

It's specific to certain models of ASUS drives, whose firmware is willing to record garbage over already written areas.

[emoticorpse]

Ursprungligen skrivet av Crashed:

Ursprungligen skrivet av emoticorpse:

This got my interest so I dug around on that program since I've never heard of it. But, doesn't seem to do what OP is looking for.

You'll see what I mean if you read this page https://hackaday.io/project/194199-sustainable-optical-media-data-destruction/log/226265-asus-e-hammer

Apart from that, actual information on hands on experience with that program seems difficult to find.

It's specific to certain models of ASUS drives, whose firmware is willing to record garbage over already written areas.

I suppose that's kind of close to what OP is talking about. If only the firmware took it just one step further and allowed it to write over the entire disc worth or written areas? I wonder why that isn't possible.

So, yeah kind of seems like a half-way point to what he's saying if I'm being honest. If those lead-in/lead-out areas are being burnt two twice, then seems like it would be possible to re-burn over the entire "write once" main area of the disc?.

I can see why it might still be impractical, but does seem to meet what OP is talking about and that my logic of "just because it's written to once means it can't be written to again" kind of fails.

[Bad 💀 Motha]

Ursprungligen skrivet av Badstormer:

Ursprungligen skrivet av emoticorpse:

Well, I agree that's an acceptable way for most people to dispose of them but seems like OP still needs a step further considering all the other things wasn't good enough.

The point of my original question wasn't actually for data destruction methods, but rather to see if a method to erase a single-use disc with regular tools was ever even possible. It just struck me as unusual that there wasn't a way to erase a disc without using destructive methods.

edit: that being said, I posit that re-burning the whole disc in a manner that actually alters the data directly is a much more secure data erasure method than just breaking the thing or scratching parts of it, considering someone with enough time and money could realistically reassemble it if the data itself hasn't been altered. Using a microwave or lighter would probably be the next most effective method if you don't mind inhaling plastic fumes.

No and it's very simple...

( R ) discs are write once and that's it, no exceptions.

( RW ) discs can be written to more then one time but any writing done does take up some space so you will waste some space if you write to these multiple times. However you don't format them like other media types. Let's say I have written to this disc 1 time and put certain files on it. I can write to it again and in this instance I can delete old files or write updated ones to the disc and after this write is complete the changes will be reflected in what files and file contents are available.

Been a while since I've used any CDRW or DVDRW. But I remember the NERO burning suite was always good for those.

Maybe others more familiar with newer apps can recommend something. Maybe something that is freeware

[Badstormer]

I think it's worth explaining why a write-once disc is write-once to begin with.

The data layer on a write-once disc is made of a material - often organic dye in the case of a DVD+/-R or DVD+R DL - that has segments quite literally burned in a specific pattern to store data. That said, as anyone who's burned anything physically can tell you, it isn't possible to 'un-burn' a disc any more than one can 'un-burn' engraved wood. Burning the same DVD-R twice would render the disc unusable, which is why drives refuse to do it.

Rewritable discs, such as a DVD+/-RW have the data side made of a material that can be reverted back to its original state, usually a form of reflective plastic. The material can be reverted to its original state by burning the whole thing with the same laser frequency, flipping any modified segments back to their unmodified state. It will still wear out over time, but it can be reused. DVD-RAM is another form of this, but with a much more durable data layer designed for frequent, extensive use.

To emphasize on how write-once discs work, you can still alter the data on them with further burning - just not in a manner that would produce useful data, as trying to flip any binary data stored as a 1 back to 0 would just erase the 1 without restoring the 0. This is the same reason exterior heat application destroys the data: it just incinerates the dye or plastic in a manner where the data on it is lost, just without the finesse that an optical disc drive's laser has. The question is, and I ask this out of pure curiosity, are there any drives on the market that don't have a firmware limitation stopping them from doing exactly this?

edit: to really hammer this point home, the fundamental reason a drive refuses to write twice isn't because you can't modify the disc any further, but because the firmware is designed to avoid accidental data loss by stopping a user from carelessly formatting a disc without realizing it isn't re-writable. I encourage anyone skeptical of this to look into how data is stored on different discs.

None of this actually changes the fact that you can't really re-use a write-once disc, of course. Whatever you write over a finalized write-once disc isn't going to be readable in any useful manner, but it would allow one to erase data without needing to manually damage the disc. I'm just having an unusually hard time finding a drive that allows a user to do this in the first place, so much so that I came here to see if it's ever even been done.