Certificate of Destruction for Business Electronics

What a good certificate lists

The device list, by type and serial number where a serial exists. The method applied to each data-bearing device. The date of destruction. The name of the company that performed it.

Who asks for it

Auditors checking a disposal procedure, clients running a vendor security review, landlords closing out a lease, insurers after an incident, and compliance teams filing under a written policy. For a healthcare practice the certificate is evidence of the disposal policy HIPAA requires you to implement.¹ For a business holding consumer data it is evidence of the "reasonable measures" the FTC Disposal Rule requires.² For a financial institution it is evidence of the secure disposal procedure the Safeguards Rule requires.³

What it is not

It does not certify the recycler; it is a record of a specific job. It does not make a factory reset into sanitization. And it is only as good as the inventory behind it: if serial numbers were never captured at collection, the certificate cannot list them. Capture them before the pickup.

How long to keep it

Keep the certificate with the collection manifest and the destruction record for each batch, in one file, for as long as your retention policy or your regulator requires. The compliance post on this site covers the wider documentation a Georgia business should keep.

Getting one for your next cleanout

American Resources issues a certificate of destruction when it destroys your drives or shreds your paper. Tell us what you have through the contact form or by phone, and we'll reply within 1 to 3 business days.

How it works