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A former tech employee claims their company is destroying over 100 high-end MacBook Pros after shutting down its office, sparking debate over corporate waste and security policies
A company’s alleged plan to destroy more than 100 MacBook Pro laptops after laying off its employees has left the internet baffled (Image- AI)
A former employee has claimed that their ex-employer plans to destroy more than 100 MacBook Pro laptops after shutting down its office in their country. The allegation, shared in a viral Reddit post, has sparked a debate over whether functional and high-end devices should be destroyed instead of being reused, donated or handed over to employees.
According to the former employee, the company shut down its office after laying off more than 200 workers in multiple rounds. The final group of employees is reportedly set to leave this month. However, what surprised the employee was not just the layoffs but what the company allegedly planned to do with the hardware left behind.
The employee claimed that instead of reusing, donating or distributing the remaining laptops, the company had decided to destroy them. Most of the devices were reportedly MacBook Pro models powered by Apple’s M4 chip and equipped with 48 GB of RAM.
“I used to work for a big tech company that decided to shut down its office in my country. More than 200 employees were laid off in several waves, and this month the last group will be gone.
What shocked me the most is what happened to the remaining hardware. Instead of reusing it, donating it, or even letting employees keep it, the company decided to destroy all the MacBooks left in the office (mostly MacBook Pro M4s with 48 GB of RAM).
I genuinely can’t understand the decision. There was no security risk that couldn’t be handled by securely wiping the drives. These laptops could have been donated to schools or nonprofits, or even offered to employees. Instead, they’re being destroyed.
I know it’s their money and they can do whatever they want, but it feels like an incredible waste of perfectly good hardware.
“What do you think? Is this normal?”
The post quickly gained traction, with several Reddit users sharing their own experiences and offering possible explanations for why companies sometimes destroy or dispose of electronic assets instead of handing them over to employees or organisations.
“It definitely happens. An organisation I used to work for did exactly this, although it was only about six computers and they were nowhere near as highly specced as these. I assumed it was some blanket security/asset-disposal policy. Destroying 100+ M4 Pros with 48GB RAM though is pretty insane,” said one user.
Another Redditor raised concerns about the effectiveness of third-party data destruction, writing, “If you check the news archives, you’ll find plenty of times companies “securely wiped” their systems, only to find out that the contractor hired to do it did nothing and shipped them to another country intact.”
One user suggested that financial considerations could be behind such decisions. “It’s all about tax write off as a loss against the layoff. Giving to employees could mean income to employee. Still can donate it, but they really want to write it off against the layoff. (Why are you donating if you have a loss?) It is still bad for everything except bottom line. Not all companies does that, my child was given the laptops and monitors when he was laid off. Most companies keeps the equipment in IT stock if it was a partial layoff,” the user said.
“Not remotely normal. Incredibly levels of waste. You can sell it to some liquidation company for incredibly cheap and not even worry about selling it (ofc there’s always the nonprofit route too)” said a fourth.
Another user wrote, “While they’re the company’s to with what they want, it seems a hard reset should have been fine and donating them at least a good write off of not good press.”
The alleged destruction of the laptops also prompted a stronger reaction from another Redditor, who commented, “This should like genuinely be illegal. Mass destruction of devices is so wasteful.”
“About few years ago was laid off from a tech company – and it was massive 200+ employees. We were all remote. They allowed us to keep our macbooks after they remote wiped it!! I’d figured it was a lot of work to have 200 macbooks sent back, tagged/organized, etc easier to let us just meep jt,” said one more user.
August 09, 2026, 10:44 IST
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