Secure Document Destruction

Sandman is correct. This company brings a shredder to your house, in the form of a large truck: http://www.shredlock.com.au

1 jerry can of gasoline check 1 bic lighter check documents destroyed tada

I use SITA.

I had nearly 50 four drawer filing cabinets full of similar material to that which you describe. We switched to electronic docs but had to keep the paper stuff for 5 years after completion. Every 6 months until last year we’d have another few filing cabinets for SITA to chew. Their big diesel-powered crosscut shredder was strong enough to make confetti out of the chunkiest metal binders.

About 5 years ago I had friend who ran a document destruction business in Canberra, which has since been bought out by one of the large national companies, and I helped him manage his business for awhile.

“Normal” document destruction involves putting the paper thought a cut cross shredder that leaves it in about 1cm wide strips, although some of the paper doesn’t get fully cut. You can quite often make out text and parts of sentences on the strips. The paper is compressed into a bundle by a modified wool baler and then shipped off to Sydney or Melbourne to be processed into recycled paper.

If you have national security type stuff it was put in a “disintegrator”, or at least that was what we called it. It is very slow, but turns your paper into wet mushy dust. That cost a hell of a lot more than the normal shredding. This is what we did for some government departments, their staff would supervise and would hang around for several hours while the disintegrator did its thing.

Most companies will give you a price based on how much metal is amongst your paper. Paper clips and staples can go through the shredders, but bulldog clips, ring binders, plastic sleeves, etc have to be manually removed first, and you will get charged a lot more for this. It would save you quite a bit if you have someone remove all the metal, plastic, etc first and just get the paper shredded.

Bear in mind that the people that work on the conveyor belt sorting out the paper from the rubbish, are generally low paid and get bored easily. If they see anything interesting coming through it would not be surprising for them to pull it out and have a read of it.

Here’s someone offering it for around $100.00:
http://www.officeworks.com.au/retail/search/shredder?sortBy=default

IrishPete said :

tommy said :

We use Recall – they have a media destruction service

How much to get them to deal with Murdoch’s evil empire?

IP

How much to get them to deal with Murdoch?

dungfungus said :

“Secure document destruction” generally means the paper content is baled and then shipped to Asia for recycling where contents are read and any information relating to identity, credit card numbers etc. are noted before they are recycled by processes that would not be environmentally acceptable in Australia. The “secure” part of the process means that the baling usually occurs in a locked shed and the baled paper is shipped overseas in a “locked” container. Getting the bales to seaports on the back of a semi trailer is not secure.

How do you recomend I dispose of my used tinfoil hats to ensure none of my thoughts can be read from it by Indonesian spies?

Can’t remember the name but there’s a company that comes and rather than taking your wheelie bin away they shred it right there in the truck while you watch. Not sure how fussy they are about folders and stuff but it was a meaty powerful machine that you wouldn’t want to get your arm caught in.

Comic_and_Gamer_Nerd said :

dungfungus said :

“Secure document destruction” generally means the paper content is baled and then shipped to Asia for recycling where contents are read and any information relating to identity, credit card numbers etc. are noted before they are recycled by processes that would not be environmentally acceptable in Australia. The “secure” part of the process means that the baling usually occurs in a locked shed and the baled paper is shipped overseas in a “locked” container. Getting the bales to seaports on the back of a semi trailer is not secure.
Unless the service provider specifically states they shred the documents (ask to see their machinery in action) you may as well buy a shredder (with metal gears) and do it yourself. Most paper shredders (with metal gears) will shred optical media as well. The shredded paper will be accepted by the local drop off facilities as long as the shred is contained in a plastic bag. Loose shred is unacceptable.
The files, sleeves, ringbinders etc. are worthless and have to be separated manually from the paper before it is subject to “secure destruction”.
Platens from hard drives should be removed and dented with a hand pick and put in a garbage bin.

Source?

Perhaps the best way for all to know if my account is credible is for you to hide in a wheelie bin and smuggle your way into a “secure destruction facility”. You would then be baled and sent to Asia or shredded.
Either way it would be a win-win outcome to most contributors to this blog.

Use the Phillip recycling centre like many others do? 🙂

Thanks all, the ‘product destruction’ rather than ‘document destruction’ tip was very helpful. Have got a few quotations to run with.
Cheers!