A "pulse" degausser uses a short powerful electromagnetic discharge (capacitive discharge) for fast and effective destruction of data on hard disk drives. A degausser displays whether the drive has been successfully deleted (or not) after each degauss cycle. The unit will measure whether the electromagnetic discharge falls within specifications to ensure data on the hard disk has been correctly removed. However, a hard disk is not physically damaged by a degausser. This makes it impossible to determine optically whether a specific hard disk has been erased with a degausser.

For reporting and auditing purposes it is necessary to be able to determine for each individual hard disk whether it has been successfully erased by a degausser. Most degausser manufacturers have in recent years developed "Data Destruction Log Report" functions. The hard disk degaussers from Garner, VS Security Products, Depei and ProDevice offer such a Log Report function.

Log report recording
The Log Report function makes it possible to record a detailed log for each degauss cycle. A degausser with Log Report function is connected to a PC via a USB connection. With the supplied software and an (optional) barcode scanner, extensive information can be entered and recorded about the degauss process of each individual hard drive;

The specific information stored in the log differs per manufacturer.

Print and export
The Log Report function makes it possible to print / export an individual report of each degauss cycle or to export multiple cycles for further processing. Every erased hard disk can be shown to have been erased in a correct manner and to no longer contain any data.

The Log Report software from VS Security Products offers an extra possibility to print specific information per degauss cycle on a sticker label. This label can then be applied to the specific hard disk for additional optical verification.

Garner Products IRONCLAD
The American manufacturer Garner Products Inc. offers, besides a Log Report function, the "IRONCLAD" verification option on all degausser models. IRONCLAD is a next step in the data destruction verification process. The IRONCLAD verification module consists of a touchscreen control panel with pre-installed Log Report software, a barcode scanner and a camera module. This camera module adds a photo (from the top with label) of every processed hard disk to each record in the regular Log Report file. With this, there is also an optical verification record of every processed hard disk.

Below you will find additional information about the Log Report functionalities of the different manufacturers.