Wipe a disk with Ubuntu.

[aliencure]

Hello again. I am trying to completely wipe drive C on my HP using the Department of Defense default (three wipes using the 0's and 1's). Said drive houses my Windows installation. Anyone know how to do this with Ubuntu 9.04?

[Therion]

The only thing an install CD will have is a formatting utility.

Use DBAN if you really want to absolutely, totally, nuke the drive from orbit.

http://www.dban.org/about

[itnet7]

I would suggest you try shred, More about shred can be found here: Shred examples

This is what I'm going to try next time I have a need!

Chris C.
itnet7

[aliencure]

Thank you all for your responses. Tried Dban with no success. I went to the Shred example page but it is EXTREMELY confusing to me. I watched the video but it told me little next to nothing on how to select a drive to wipe. I really would not know what to do. If someone can give me a step-by-step basis to work with I might be able to pull it off. Thank you all for any help you can give me.

[itnet7]

I will try and see if I can document the use of shred here for you... to overwrite the c partition.

Thanks,

Chris C.
itnet7

[aliencure]

Here is what came up in terminal when I tried using shred commands:

derek@derek-desktop:~$ shred -f -n 3 -u -v -x -z hp
shred: hp: failed to open for writing: No such file or directory
derek@derek-desktop:~$

I used "hp" because that is how it is listed under the "places" menu. Though I found pages making shred less confusing, apparently I am still unsure how to locate the drive to be shredded. Any suggestions?

[stefangr1]

shred -vfz -n 1 <partition>

The partition you wan't to erease has a name like /dev/sda or /dev/hda.
If you don't know the name of your partition you can look it up with the command "sudo fdisk -l"

Only one single overwrite will do. After that, at very high expenses (team of experts with fully equipped lab, electron microscope etc.) is needed to recover (if they're lucky) tiny fragments of data...

[aliencure]

This time I performed command and the end result:

derek@derek-desktop:~$ sudo fdisk -l

Disk /dev/sda: 750.1 GB, 750156374016 bytes
255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 91201 cylinders
Units = cylinders of 16065 * 512 = 8225280 bytes
Disk identifier: 0x217df2e4

Device Boot Start End Blocks Id System
/dev/sda1 * 1 89741 720844551 7 HPFS/NTFS
/dev/sda2 89742 91201 11727450 7 HPFS/NTFS

Disk /dev/sdb: 500.1 GB, 500107862016 bytes
255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 60801 cylinders
Units = cylinders of 16065 * 512 = 8225280 bytes
Disk identifier: 0xba41ba41

Device Boot Start End Blocks Id System
/dev/sdb1 1 58600 470704468+ 83 Linux
/dev/sdb2 58601 60801 17679532+ 5 Extended
/dev/sdb5 58601 60801 17679501 82 Linux swap / Solaris
derek@derek-desktop:~$ shred -vfz -n 3 /dev/sda1
shred: /dev/sda1: failed to open for writing: Operation not permitted
derek@derek-desktop:~$

Downloaded dban and tried again with a disk image but it still did not work.

[itnet7]

Originally Posted by aliencure This time I performed command and the end result: derek@derek-desktop:~$ sudo fdisk -l Disk /dev/sda: 750.1 GB, 750156374016 bytes 255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 91201 cylinders Units = cylinders of 16065 * 512 = 8225280 bytes Disk identifier: 0x217df2e4 Device Boot Start End Blocks Id System /dev/sda1 * 1 89741 720844551 7 HPFS/NTFS /dev/sda2 89742 91201 11727450 7 HPFS/NTFS Disk /dev/sdb: 500.1 GB, 500107862016 bytes 255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 60801 cylinders Units = cylinders of 16065 * 512 = 8225280 bytes Disk identifier: 0xba41ba41 Device Boot Start End Blocks Id System /dev/sdb1 1 58600 470704468+ 83 Linux /dev/sdb2 58601 60801 17679532+ 5 Extended /dev/sdb5 58601 60801 17679501 82 Linux swap / Solaris derek@derek-desktop:~$ shred -vfz -n 3 /dev/sda1 shred: /dev/sda1: failed to open for writing: Operation not permitted derek@derek-desktop:~$ Downloaded dban and tried again with a disk image but it still did not work.

You would have to run the command with root privileges:

sudo shred -vfz -n 3 /dev/sda1

Try that and let us know if it works for you!

Chris C.
itnet7

[aliencure]

DOH! Why didn't I think to try typing Sudo before the shred command? Thank you guys. Problem has been solved.