As a comprehensive data recovery app, Disk Drill requires low-level access to the scanned storage devices. The macOS operating system gives such a privileged level of access only to the most trusted software, and Disk Drill is the premier solution to recover deleted data not only from external drives, but also system disks powering Macs with Intel, Apple T2, M1, M2 and M3 chips.

Disk Drill achieves the necessary level of access by deploying its own kernel extension (known as kext). This extension allows Disk Drill to cooperate with the macOS kernel to access your data storage devices and extract recoverable data from them.