{"guid":"cd66723d-23cc-40e7-9b76-f9b38dc576ab","title":"How to Destroy a Laptop with Top Secrets","subtitle":"How did GCHQ do it to the Guardian's copy of Snowden's files?","slug":"camp2015-6799-how_to_destroy_a_laptop_with_top_secrets","link":"https://events.ccc.de/camp/2015/Fahrplan/events/6799.html","description":"In the summer of 2013, Guardian employees destroyed computers storing top secret documents from Snowden, on instruction and supervision from GCHQ. With access to the destroyed pieces, we investigated what GCHQ's instructions were and what we can learn from it about securely eradicating data on a machine.","original_language":"eng","persons":["Mustafa Al-Bassam","Richard Tynan"],"view_count":38719,"promoted":false,"date":"2015-08-16T21:15:00.000+02:00","release_date":"2015-08-17T02:00:00.000+02:00","updated_at":"2026-03-25T14:15:06.110+01:00","tags":["Security \u0026 Hacking"],"length":3518,"duration":3518,"thumb_url":"https://static.media.ccc.de/media/conferences/camp2015/6799-hd.jpg","poster_url":"https://static.media.ccc.de/media/conferences/camp2015/6799-hd_preview.jpg","timeline_url":"https://static.media.ccc.de/media/conferences/camp2015/cd66723d-23cc-40e7-9b76-f9b38dc576ab-timeline.jpg","thumbnails_url":"https://static.media.ccc.de/media/conferences/camp2015/cd66723d-23cc-40e7-9b76-f9b38dc576ab-thumbnails.vtt","frontend_link":"https://media.ccc.de/v/camp2015-6799-how_to_destroy_a_laptop_with_top_secrets","url":"https://api.media.ccc.de/public/events/cd66723d-23cc-40e7-9b76-f9b38dc576ab","conference_title":"Chaos Communication Camp 2015","conference_url":"https://api.media.ccc.de/public/conferences/camp2015","related":[{"event_id":2172,"event_guid":"ELK9-ZQeFcqKxBYW8eay8g","weight":4},{"event_id":2465,"event_guid":"d1f3810f-43b1-4856-b8ee-7c767234d185","weight":5},{"event_id":2466,"event_guid":"882370ef-642d-43ba-b91d-22e9e87e9a1f","weight":11},{"event_id":2468,"event_guid":"97cbc2a0-7d63-4d54-9ff6-fb1b8ed30380","weight":11},{"event_id":2470,"event_guid":"c131b08d-e1be-4658-b98a-a223bc746784","weight":21},{"event_id":2472,"event_guid":"e8d65b1e-ce8a-4307-b056-e8b60461c825","weight":6},{"event_id":2473,"event_guid":"f83350dc-8152-422c-921f-379b018c0fa2","weight":7},{"event_id":2476,"event_guid":"eab5b0db-c441-4f14-89eb-939585061555","weight":7},{"event_id":2477,"event_guid":"cb9bc487-84aa-4f9c-931a-6de0bdf25e43","weight":6},{"event_id":2482,"event_guid":"46d21af4-3f70-4024-b7bd-52d40634b891","weight":7},{"event_id":2487,"event_guid":"581757d7-5b47-491c-8907-9aa5d235edb8","weight":5},{"event_id":2490,"event_guid":"f1e0faf3-f906-4abc-8218-9f42e10f8a1c","weight":5},{"event_id":2492,"event_guid":"2b4f6479-8241-4ede-b025-328d476c52ba","weight":10},{"event_id":2494,"event_guid":"f29c721d-4917-4705-aa87-0281d89f8655","weight":5},{"event_id":2496,"event_guid":"54159b05-db61-4055-b2ae-f4a16559ccfe","weight":7},{"event_id":2498,"event_guid":"cdc39fc3-715d-4610-b633-3821e4762aa4","weight":10},{"event_id":2500,"event_guid":"6587bc79-27e5-4cf3-847b-77b0acc96682","weight":4},{"event_id":2502,"event_guid":"a707951f-7f9c-4c8e-8f4f-b837f3581b7b","weight":5},{"event_id":2504,"event_guid":"d0042aa3-5e7a-4a64-8bb5-c0cf4d639b1a","weight":5},{"event_id":2505,"event_guid":"b17ff452-d735-49b4-b91f-b8f7cd62dad2","weight":9},{"event_id":2508,"event_guid":"ed4bcb3b-fe2d-4728-812d-a45dbd4d01db","weight":27},{"event_id":2513,"event_guid":"bd046a46-8398-4b6f-b4e3-34f34e6f1ecc","weight":5},{"event_id":2514,"event_guid":"045e7aa9-5e12-4baf-98b2-e3fd31159851","weight":7},{"event_id":2515,"event_guid":"b8a7511e-143d-45c5-b974-2e91dab18814","weight":4},{"event_id":2518,"event_guid":"9a28ef84-3ba0-4c12-9f8a-115b30bc3ec0","weight":13},{"event_id":2523,"event_guid":"afe359da-56c9-4e76-8f56-45ed406494e5","weight":5},{"event_id":2528,"event_guid":"6393a33b-889d-4850-b0e3-cbc7caeab1cb","weight":8},{"event_id":2529,"event_guid":"59a1be98-a1b0-4031-bbc4-18ca3feeb189","weight":11},{"event_id":2530,"event_guid":"a4478dbf-90c0-4633-aa8e-4fe993840089","weight":10},{"event_id":2534,"event_guid":"0e66ac36-d9c6-4900-b532-4f651dd39582","weight":9},{"event_id":2538,"event_guid":"a5f996a3-d0a7-44e7-ac1b-6373a297ccf3","weight":4},{"event_id":2545,"event_guid":"2ee47684-8114-4361-8f3e-8b61946d8335","weight":12},{"event_id":2546,"event_guid":"bd4515b7-fdcf-4d9b-8fc8-0ec47f5c8a80","weight":9},{"event_id":2551,"event_guid":"f8909f2d-fac5-4d5f-b483-cff184591b0c","weight":12},{"event_id":2944,"event_guid":"5fb6f7b5-c237-4b64-b786-85e4c95f13ad","weight":5},{"event_id":3615,"event_guid":"74783236-46f4-493c-9574-1b27a44847b7","weight":7},{"event_id":3640,"event_guid":"700a07e7-a9c4-437b-a4c5-4491b23a9b4a","weight":4},{"event_id":3673,"event_guid":"9e02145e-1d65-4398-b8e2-bd4c1faee0fa","weight":4},{"event_id":3689,"event_guid":"1f7eb981-2819-4824-8f40-4ddde0be7bf3","weight":6},{"event_id":3703,"event_guid":"65833373-6cae-4f9d-947b-c93a83ff1ba1","weight":7},{"event_id":3762,"event_guid":"25e2df7d-5740-4c2f-bc34-986326d606fe","weight":5},{"event_id":3782,"event_guid":"dec1ddb6-e4f3-11e6-ba49-a38509dc3679","weight":5},{"event_id":4240,"event_guid":"dec63dd2-d66b-419d-863d-c20fd5ce91dd","weight":5},{"event_id":4779,"event_guid":"544e7736-6b59-4c05-87a7-c013ef993688","weight":8},{"event_id":5231,"event_guid":"38433858-5443-2020-2020-202020202020","weight":4},{"event_id":7251,"event_guid":"b69c19ce-7c89-4afd-9396-ea664f80dba7 ","weight":14}],"recordings":[{"size":40,"length":3504,"mime_type":"audio/opus","language":"eng","filename":"cccamp15-6799-en-de-How_to_Destroy_a_Laptop_with_Top_Secrets_opus.opus","state":"downloaded","folder":"opus","high_quality":true,"width":null,"height":null,"updated_at":"2015-08-17T17:13:19.759+02:00","recording_url":"https://cdn.media.ccc.de/events/camp2015/opus/cccamp15-6799-en-de-How_to_Destroy_a_Laptop_with_Top_Secrets_opus.opus","url":"https://api.media.ccc.de/public/recordings/7131","event_url":"https://api.media.ccc.de/public/events/cd66723d-23cc-40e7-9b76-f9b38dc576ab","conference_url":"https://api.media.ccc.de/public/conferences/camp2015"},{"size":347,"length":3518,"mime_type":"video/webm","language":"eng","filename":"cccamp15-6799-en-de-How_to_Destroy_a_Laptop_with_Top_Secrets_webm-sd.webm","state":"downloaded","folder":"webm-sd","high_quality":false,"width":720,"height":576,"updated_at":"2016-02-03T14:10:00.654+01:00","recording_url":"https://cdn.media.ccc.de/events/camp2015/webm-sd/cccamp15-6799-en-de-How_to_Destroy_a_Laptop_with_Top_Secrets_webm-sd.webm","url":"https://api.media.ccc.de/public/recordings/7232","event_url":"https://api.media.ccc.de/public/events/cd66723d-23cc-40e7-9b76-f9b38dc576ab","conference_url":"https://api.media.ccc.de/public/conferences/camp2015"},{"size":53,"length":3504,"mime_type":"audio/mpeg","language":"eng","filename":"cccamp15-6799-en-de-How_to_Destroy_a_Laptop_with_Top_Secrets_mp3.mp3","state":"downloaded","folder":"mp3","high_quality":true,"width":null,"height":null,"updated_at":"2015-08-17T17:13:34.698+02:00","recording_url":"https://cdn.media.ccc.de/events/camp2015/mp3/cccamp15-6799-en-de-How_to_Destroy_a_Laptop_with_Top_Secrets_mp3.mp3","url":"https://api.media.ccc.de/public/recordings/7132","event_url":"https://api.media.ccc.de/public/events/cd66723d-23cc-40e7-9b76-f9b38dc576ab","conference_url":"https://api.media.ccc.de/public/conferences/camp2015"},{"size":278,"length":3518,"mime_type":"video/mp4","language":"eng","filename":"cccamp15-6799-en-de-How_to_Destroy_a_Laptop_with_Top_Secrets_sd.mp4","state":"downloaded","folder":"h264-sd","high_quality":false,"width":720,"height":576,"updated_at":"2016-02-03T14:09:54.385+01:00","recording_url":"https://cdn.media.ccc.de/events/camp2015/h264-sd/cccamp15-6799-en-de-How_to_Destroy_a_Laptop_with_Top_Secrets_sd.mp4","url":"https://api.media.ccc.de/public/recordings/7158","event_url":"https://api.media.ccc.de/public/events/cd66723d-23cc-40e7-9b76-f9b38dc576ab","conference_url":"https://api.media.ccc.de/public/conferences/camp2015"},{"size":857,"length":3518,"mime_type":"video/mp4","language":"eng","filename":"cccamp15-6799-en-de-How_to_Destroy_a_Laptop_with_Top_Secrets_hd.mp4","state":"downloaded","folder":"h264-hd","high_quality":true,"width":1920,"height":1080,"updated_at":"2016-02-03T14:09:47.969+01:00","recording_url":"https://cdn.media.ccc.de/events/camp2015/h264-hd/cccamp15-6799-en-de-How_to_Destroy_a_Laptop_with_Top_Secrets_hd.mp4","url":"https://api.media.ccc.de/public/recordings/7125","event_url":"https://api.media.ccc.de/public/events/cd66723d-23cc-40e7-9b76-f9b38dc576ab","conference_url":"https://api.media.ccc.de/public/conferences/camp2015"},{"size":570,"length":3518,"mime_type":"video/webm","language":"eng","filename":"cccamp15-6799-en-de-How_to_Destroy_a_Laptop_with_Top_Secrets_webm-hd.webm","state":"downloaded","folder":"webm-hd","high_quality":true,"width":1920,"height":1080,"updated_at":"2016-02-03T14:10:00.547+01:00","recording_url":"https://cdn.media.ccc.de/events/camp2015/webm-hd/cccamp15-6799-en-de-How_to_Destroy_a_Laptop_with_Top_Secrets_webm-hd.webm","url":"https://api.media.ccc.de/public/recordings/7231","event_url":"https://api.media.ccc.de/public/events/cd66723d-23cc-40e7-9b76-f9b38dc576ab","conference_url":"https://api.media.ccc.de/public/conferences/camp2015"}]}