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Degaussing is the process of reducing a magnetic field to virtually zero by applying a strong, oscillating, and reverse-magnetizing field, primarily used to destroy data on magnetic storage media like hard drives and tapes, rendering the data permanently unrecoverable. While it's a crucial technique for secure data destruction and protecting sensitive information, degaussing is ineffective for solid-state drives (SSDs) and flash memory, as these devices do not use magnetic storage.

How Degaussing Works

Magnetic Domains: Hard drives, tapes, and other magnetic media store data by aligning tiny magnetic regions, called magnetic domains, in a particular direction.

Disrupting Alignment: A degausser applies a powerful magnetic field that fluctuates in intensity and polarity, effectively disrupting and randomizing the alignment of these magnetic domains.

Data Erasure: This randomization makes the previously stored data completely unreadable and inaccessible.