ISRI2022: Navigating ITAD certification and managing device volume amid labor shortages

ISRI2022: Navigating ITAD certification and managing device volume amid labor shortages
<![CDATA[

Last year saw the highest number of data breaches on record. According to an Identity Theft Resource Center 2021 report, there were 1,862 breaches last year—up 68 percent from 2020, which surpassed the previous record of 1,506 set in 2017.

Concern is rising among recycling professionals surrounding data and privacy, particularly when it comes to electronics recycling, and panelists at the Institute of Scrap Recycling Industries (ISRI) 2022 Convention and Exposition, held March 21-24 in Las Vegas, discussed navigating information technology asset disposition (ITAD) compliance as more companies have seen a recent increase in device volume.

According to the WEEE (waste electronic and electrical equipment) Forum, an estimated 57.4 million tons of e-scrap were generated last year and 53.6 million metric tons were generated in 2019—a problem it attributes to higher consumption rates of electronics, shorter product life cycles and limited repair options.

“There are real constraints that are being added in the market,” said Russ Ernst, executive vice president of product and technology at Finland-based Blancco. “The concern is really about if any of those assets that go through the waste-processing process or go through a refurbishment process to go back onto the market, there has to be an awareness that if any asset comes back onto the market with personally identifiable information, you are held liable—you are responsible for that asset.”

Ernst said from an ITAD standpoint, many view data erasure, or data sanitization, as the “last step between when that device is going through its first life before it transitions over to its second life into the circular economy.”

But with data erasure comes compliance requirements that vary from industry to industry, making it difficult to know whether a business is in compliance and where to begin when it comes to regulatory standards. “As the world’s population is becoming part of this type of privacy legislation, it’s important across every single market, every single industry,” Ernst said. “As we start to think about where things are changing in the market, it’s going to become much more important to understand even your customers’ or your customers’ customers’ compliance requirements.”

Karen Fedder, director of ITAD, North America, at Blancco, said IT asset managers have become very educated “through other people’s mistakes,” as it pertains to the rise in data breaches, adding that emerging standards are requiring data erasure regardless of physical destruction. “If you have the opportunity to do that erasure, it’s an extra level of security,” she said.

Ernst said that as new compliance requirements are implemented, a major focus should be obtaining an erasure certificate—some kind of proof that asset has gone through a data sanitization process. “In today’s world, with the mass proliferation of data-bearing assets, you start to think about just the number of mobile devices on the market today. Everything is collecting data. … That’s probably the key in terms of navigating those compliance requirements.”

The panelists also discussed managing device volumes amid labor shortages. Fedder said the ITAD industry is seeing more devices coming back than prepandemic and that most companies are having record volume. “They’re sitting on a lot of money,” she said. “You have to be able to process that fast enough to be able to start recouping they money. You’re sitting on millions of dollars, potentially, hundreds of thousands depending on the size of your business.”

But concerns remain about shredding vs. erasure, and both Fedder and Ernst said companies can assure clients that erasure is both safe and effective. “This is where some of the legislation in the standards have to be really ratified and finalized in terms of making sure there is something you can point to and say, ‘Yes, this is secure because it meets [this standard],” Ernst said.

He added, “This is where we’ve seen a huge change in terms of taking those drives, going through a secure data sanitization and still had that erasure certificate by asset, by individual serial number, that can prove the data has been removed from that drive instead of going through physical destruction.”

But the challenge is navigating the record volumes with fewer staff as labor shortages continue throughout the industry. Historically, much of the material has been processed manually—getting the numbers, having an operator know which device is getting processed for which client. “The way to get around that now and be able to get that higher revenue and not do it by the pound and rather do it by the device is through automation,” Fedder said.

“There’s various ways to do it,” she added. “Knowing in advance what the clients want [and] have the operator do the minimal amount of work, and by doing that you can hire people that aren’t necessarily very skilled [yet] and get them on the floor quickly.”

She added that often it takes 12 to 16 weeks to get an operator up to speed. Often, one device will get different grades from different operators based on their level of skill and experience. Automation then can increase processing and therefore increase value.

Device volumes also have ballooned as the pandemic increased the number of devices required as much of the world shifted to remote work and the 5G network was introduced. “The real important thing from a circular economy perspective is that the devices from a year-and-a-half ago that only had 4G … still have a lot of retail value, especially for regions in the world that are not 5G-enabled,” Fedder said.

Ernst echoed the push for automation at every step of the process. “It comes down to efficient handling of those different types of materials,” he said. “There are opportunities for automation on every single business process you have…and thinking about how certain materials need to be handled in a consistent way.”

]]>
Source: Recycling Today
ISRI2022: Navigating ITAD certification and managing device volume amid labor shortages
<![CDATA[Last year saw the highest number of data breaches on record. According to an Identity Theft Resource Center 2021 report, there were 1,862 breaches last year—up 68 percent from 2020, which surpassed the previous record of 1,506 set in 2017.Concern is rising among recycling professionals surrounding data and privacy, particularly when it comes to electronics recycling, and panelists at the Institute of Scrap Recycling Industries (ISRI) 2022 Convention and Exposition, held March 21-24 in Las Vegas, discussed navigating information technology asset disposition (ITAD) compliance as more companies have seen a recent increase in device volume.According to the WEEE (waste electronic and electrical equipment) Forum, an estimated 57.4 million tons of e-scrap were generated last year and 53.6 million metric tons were generated in 2019—a problem it attributes to higher consumption rates of electronics, shorter product life cycles and limited repair options.“There are real constraints that are being added in the market,” said Russ Ernst, executive vice president of product and technology at Finland-based Blancco. “The concern is really about if any of those assets that go through the waste-processing process or go through a refurbishment process to go back onto the market, there has to be an awareness that if…