What is the most secure way to erase an APFS encrypted external hard drive?
So I am returning a faulty but still functioning hard drive to Amazon and would like opinions on the most secure way to erase the drive before returning it, to eliminate the possibility of data recovery. I'm thinking I could Click "Erase" and then reformat as APFS encrypted. It would seems that an Amazon employee could not then access the drive's contents -- is that correct? What about when the drive arrives back at the manufacturer's facility?
I had previously formatted the drive as APFS encrypted using Disk Utility on my M1 Macbook Pro. I should mention that, just prior to doing that, I had used it as an unencrypted drive that stored many sensitive files.
To summarize, does my plan sound bullet-proof, and if not, might you have a better idea?
(Keeping the drive and using it as a paperweight is not an option, because I've done this with many bad drives and I can't keep wasting all that money.)
Thank you!
MacBook Pro (2020 and later)
