Tape Buyback Program

Tape Buyback Program Turn your old technology into tomorrow’s budget. Dispose of your scratch pools and outdated tape formats and earn back money at the same time. All while adhering to SAS 70 and Sarbanes-Oxley regulations that ensure the safe and secure eradication of your data.

DataSpan began the Tape Buyback Program in 1974 as an innovative, cost-effective Nine-Point Process to help our customers reclaim the value of scratch tape and redeploy tapes for future use. When you participate in this program, we handle your data with extreme sensitivity at all times. All of our work is done in our secure Operations Center with proprietary processes that ensure complete data eradication.

100% Secure Data Eradication: Our Nine-Point Process

Our process ensures that every tape that enters our Tape Buyback Program is 100%
drive-tested end-to-end to guarantee complete data eradication. Here's how our nine-point proprietary data eradication process works:

1) Tape Audit

DataSpan staff audit your tapes and provide you with an electronic file that contains the volser numbers for all tapes that are being purchased to crosscheck with your current tapes, ensuring no active tape was mistakenly pulled.

2) Secure Transport

Your tapes are safely transported to our secure Operations Center for data eradication under strict controls.

3) Final Destination Audit

Your tapes are audited again upon arrival at our Operations Center and you receive another electronic file containing volser numbers for all tapes received.
This practice verifies that all of your tapes are accounted for and have been received.

4) Cleaning

Tapes are tissue cleaned.

5) Retensioning

Tapes are retensioned to OEM standards.

6) Optical Scanning

Tapes are optically scanned for physical defects, including edge damage.
All damaged tapes are immediately removed from the process, data eradicated and disposed of.

7) Data Eradication

Standard tape cartridges are degaussed, and high-density servo track tapes are overwritten with DataSpan’s proprietary code end-to-end, rendering any previous data completely unreadable.

8) Final Inspection and Eradication

All tapes go through a Final Quality Control Inspection and Validation to ensure any previously readable data is eradicated. Tapes with any permanent errors, or more than our strict minimum of ECCs, are removed from processing and immediately disposed of.

9) Redeployment

The process for creating DataSpan’s 100% Certified Tape is complete. Every tape is backed by our Performance Guarantee.

SAS 70 Compliance for Secure Data Eradication

SAS 70 stands for "Statement on Auditing Standards" by the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants (AICPA) and determines the professional standards a service auditor uses in a formal report to measure the internal controls of a service organization. DataSpan is one of the only Datacenter products and services companies to have SAS 70 compliance, verifying the security and thoroughness of every step of our servo-track media certification and data eradication processes.