Technology writer Mat Honan was "epically hacked," in a widely-circulated cautionary tale that should have you changing your passwords and turning on secondary authentication measures. The Novato, California-based firm DriveSavers helped Mat get his data back, and he traveled to the clean room to see how they did it. (wired.com)

  • awjt

    I’ve always fantasized about a happy ending in a clean room.  #geekdreams

    • Boundegar

       I thought that came with a massage, not data recovery services…

      • awjt

        The happy ending IS the data recovery.  THAT’S the data.

    • http://profiles.yahoo.com/u/OKEONAMLFIOS5WI7MPQY6SXBCQ IRMO

      That’s one way to retire a clean room.

  • Rob Wheeler

    This company must see SO MUCH porn.

  • http://profiles.yahoo.com/u/OKEONAMLFIOS5WI7MPQY6SXBCQ IRMO

    I’ll add my pseudonym to the list of happy DriveSavers customers. Those dudes rock.

  • http://twitter.com/sally_j Sally J.

    As an archivist, I have to shout this next part:

    BACK! UP! YOUR! DATA!

    Just remember 3-2-1: 3 copies, stored on 2 different kinds of media, in more than 1 place.

    • http://twitter.com/sally_j Sally J.

       …costs a lot less than $2 grand, too. ;)

      • curgoth

        …at current disk prices, for me at least, it would probably cost more than $2k to maintain 3 copies of my data.

    • http://profiles.yahoo.com/u/OKEONAMLFIOS5WI7MPQY6SXBCQ IRMO

      And another reminder: 1GB is enough space for all the keyboard input you will generate in your entire life. 

      SD cards. Use multiples. 

      • retepslluerb

        That’s a strange metric.   I don’t see how any meaningful amount of work could be reconstructed by replaying the keyboard input stream.

        • http://profiles.yahoo.com/u/OKEONAMLFIOS5WI7MPQY6SXBCQ IRMO

          That’s usually not how your written work is saved, that is true, but my point stands: all the prose you write, the code you write, the music you write, the CAD you generate, all that will fit in a single GB. 

          • retepslluerb

            If you put put that way, yes.  However, it doesn’t work if you consider transformative works.

  • willu

    So, does this mean we shouldn’t trust Apple’s remote wipe?

    (This isn’t meant to be an anti-apple comment, but you can only have things one way.  If the data is recoverable by you, then it is recoverable by someone else.  I also suspect that if filevault (Apple’s encryption) had been switched on then things wouldn’t have been recoverable.)

    • ocker3

       It seems like he also powered off the machine part-way through the wipe process, as it apparently happened while he was on the phone with Apple.

      • taintofevil

        If filevault is on, wiping the disc is just erasing the encryption key, which is really quick.  If filevault is off, wiping the disc is actually writing on every sector, which takes a long time.

  • http://twitter.com/librtee Sasha@librtee

    I’m surprised they needed a clean room? I mean, there was no hadware damage, basically just the file tables were wiped out. It’s a major pain in the ass recovering from that (sorry Imran! :(      ), but you don’t have to physically open the drives…

    • howaboutthisdangit

      That’s what I was thinking.  But then again, a story about the wonders of TestDisk probably would not sell as well.