Get Access to Print and Digital for $23.99 per year.
Subscribe for Full Access

Workers sealing valuables with a canning machine at Iron Mountain, 1952. Courtesy Historic Images 

I see more shredding trucks in New York than I used to. They park around the city for “community shredding” events, where neighbors, friends, and loved ones convene to watch their old bank statements and medical records become curly, illegible ribbons. One such truck I’ve seen was emblazoned with a slogan: secure destruction you can trust. But I’d never thought to give destruction anything less than my total trust. The truck belonged to Iron Mountain, a corporation in the business of both destroying information and preserving it, named for a former mine in the…

Subscribe or to continue reading.

Close
“An unexpectedly excellent magazine that stands out amid a homogenized media landscape.” —the New York Times
Subscribe now

Debug