The Risks And Costs Of Poor E-Waste Management

Every year, New Zealand generates over 80,000 tonnes of electronic waste: desktop computers, laptops, tablets, phones, printers, scanners and the like. Most, if not all, of your e-waste contains sensitive data and highly confidential information. Just 1 GB of data can equal as many as 675,000 pages of information. If that was to fall into the wrong hands, it could lead to a breach that has massive reputational repercussions and a financial cost your business could not afford, and that exposes you or your customers’ personal information. This is why our e-waste management service is one of the most important we offer.

Technology giant IBM says that in 2020, the average cost of a data breach was NZD $3.58 million per breach. This represented an increase of 9.8% from 2019. In the same period, the cost of a lost or stolen record was $163, an increase of 3.8%. Alarmingly, 80% of breaches resulted in a customers’ personally identifiable information being exposed. And if that’s not enough, it took an average of 211 days for businesses to identify and contain a breach.

You might think that data breaches occur when onsite technology is compromised. You may also think that the risks are low when it comes to the unlawful procurement of information from decommissioned computer equipment and associated storage devices. We urge you to think again. At NZD $3.58 million per breach, can you afford to take any risk at all with your e-waste?

Our e-waste service renders unwanted equipment useless. We collect and physically destroy decommissioned digital media to particle size thereby protecting any data that was still stored on the device. And you don’t have to be a large corporation to take advantage of this service; it’s available for households and small businesses too, with an optional service allowing for data back-up to a secure cloud-hosted platform prior to destruction.

We’re members of the National Association for Information Destruction (NAID). Our Wellington branch is NAID AAA certified for secure destruction of information contained on media such as paper, micro media and physical hard drives. We’re the only NAID member in New Zealand holding AAA accreditation. At our other nationwide branches, we destroy documents and media with compliance to NAID AAA standards.

Whether it’s a single hard drive or a multiple IT asset decommission and secure disposal, we’ll reduce the risk – and it is a very real one. Contact us today and take no chances.