Does the RT-N66U retain data? please advise

[BreakingDad]

I may be a little paranoid here, I am thinking of selling my old router, but I have concerns it may retain personal data of myself and family?

Is this even possible after a hard reset?

The logical side of me tells me it is not powerful enough to do this, but the paranoid side of me says there are Russians waiting on ebay to buy my router and rip me off?

Please could someone clever confirm my worries are unfounded?

 

[Tech9]

Data in digital form - unlikely. Data in DNA form - probably. You and your family members constantly renew your skin and microparticles if it are everywhere inside your home, perhaps inside your router too. You never know what technology crazy Russians on eBay possess. They may extract your DNA, clone your entire family somewhere in Siberia and run experiments on you. Don't sell it - burn it!

 

[wh7qq]

Burn it but don your tinfoil hat before setting it ablaze

 

[dosborne]

Short of pulling the chips off and reading them bit by bit, you are pretty safe after a reset, if done properly.

Can't imagine a N66U is worth much these days though, personally I just chuck my old gear into storage in case someone needs an emergency replacement, network expansion, or I want to mess around with some new options or something.

 

[BreakingDad]

Cloning my family, that's a great idea in principal, I think ultimately the world would be a better place if we took over. Regarding its worth, they go for about £40 on ebay. Every little helps.

 

[wh7qq]

Still a damned good router...just returned the ISP's Zyxel to use the '66...just as fast on Ethernet and the web interface isn't neutered like the Zyxel. 8 yrs old and still kickin! John's Fork firmware so it is still up-to-date.

 

[wh7qq]

While this is close to the original poster's topic, heysoundude's reply really should be in a topic of its own.

That said, I am not sure that normal reset procedures totally erase the memory. I recently went through a fit of "numerous" resets and it seemed as though a few things got held over, but maybe they were defaults. It returned from the "reset" to the default "admin/admin" to access the web interface. It came up to the "Quick Internet Setup" menu and insisted on a wireless name and passphrase for both 2.4 and 5 GHz wireless channels. Seemed like a reset. A few settings seemed to have held over from the previous setup...don't recall which. In any case, I was able to load the latest update of John's Fork and it seems to be totally happy. My reset was accomplished with a prolonged press of the "reset" button...20+ sec just to be safe. As the button is recessed to just below case level, some care is necessary to be sure it is down all the way for the entire period.

There are settings for both WAN and LAN menus for choice of DNS servers 1 and 2. On the WAN settings, If you fail to select "no" for automatic settings, changing the DNS setting seems to lock up the router. I left the LAN setting blank and it seems OK.

I have never experienced a failure to reset so I can't advise further.

 

[Tech9]

heysoundude's reply really should be in a topic of its own.

What @heysoundude reply?

 

[heysoundude]

What @heysoundude reply?

sorry, I posted one and then had 2nd thoughts and deleted it...

 

[wh7qq]

What @heysoundude reply?

Oh , he deleted it...thought I was loosing it (and I probably am).

 

[Zulgrib]

You can format jffs or /etc/storage if you use an ASUS based firmware.
Then reset to remove your config from nvram.

If you use openwrt, you can clear everything from the web interface.