In five seconds, this SSD will self-destruct: 5… 4… 3… 2…

When we think about storage, the primary concern is usually reliability – you need to know that the data you save remain safe and accessible. But there are plenty of other things to consider, and new offerings from TEAMGROUP takes a unique approach to security.

With the internal P250Q‑M80 NVMe SSD and the portable T‑Create Expert P35S external, there is not only military-grade AES-256 encryption to ensure data is not going to fall into the wrong hands, but also an uninterruptible self-destruct option. Push a red button on either of the devices and they can be wiped, or completely nuked – and nothing can stop the process.

This is not something to be taken lightly. The ability to quickly wipe a drive so it is ready for a new project is a nice touch, but self-destruction is something else. Let’s be clear – this is not something that everyone will need or use, but the way in which hardware and software solutions have been employed here is impressive.

TEAMGROUP says of the one-click data destruction feature:

With a single press of the button, data destruction is executed effortlessly. The button intelligently triggers different erasure modes based on press duration, and LED indicators provide real-time status feedback. This design ensures intuitive operation for professional use.

What does this mean in practice? A hit press of the button is all it takes to perform a standard format of the drive to wipe out data, but leave the device usable. Long-press the button, however, and self-destruct mode is activated.

This process goes far beyond just erasing data; self-destruction really is a physical process that renders the drive unusable and the data it once contains completely inaccessible. In self-destruct mode, there is a different hardware component involved. By activating a high-voltage circuit, the drive is zapped so it can never be used again. This involves physical damage, not just software trickery.

And there is no going back once the self-destruct process has started. Even if the process is interrupted because of an unplanned power outage, or someone trying to pull the plug to safe data, the moment power is restored, the destruction process will pick up from where it left off.

Other specs are relatively unremarkable, but this is not about storage performance. The key selling point here is the ability to kill a drive and its contents should this need arise. This is clearly fairly specialist, but it’s something that will be of interest for government and military usage, as well as in finance and other business sectors.

There are various capacities available -- 256GB, 512GB, 1TB and 2TB – but pricing is not available. Anyone interested in the self-destructing drive is invited to enquire directly to TEAMGROUP. The fact that pricing is not being shared publicly suggests one thing – this is not going to be cheap.

But regardless of the price, is this an idea that appeals to you?