Malware Paranoia/Questions

[uRock]

Please stop posting the advice to leave the CMOS jumper on clear when booting before someone fries there computer trying it.

[ricyaun]

Please stop posting the advice to leave the CMOS jumper on clear when booting before someone fries there computer trying it.

Ok. I forget that handling the hardware is what I do. By the way it won't fry their computer, but I do forget that I graduated from the 1st logic circuit course the US Navy ever had, and have never looked back. Not a brag. I really do forget that other people aren't as hardware friendly as I keep assuming everybody is. My bad. Please don't call me paranoid. Just because I am experiencing something way out of the ordinary. It has given me a lot of up close, and personal experience that you don't normally get.

[hithisisatempaccount1532]

Easy boys...
So this Gutmann method, how do I do this? And would my devices other than my PCs be OK after formatting their storage devices and resetting them to factory default/hard reset?

Thanks again ^_^

[CharlesA]

Gutmann is overkill tbh. You can use DBAN to run it on a hard drive, but it's a waste of time/energy.

DoD 3 pass wipe is fine for most people.

[hithisisatempaccount1532]

And how do I do this?

What about my other devices?

[OpSecShellshock]

For your other devices I'd suggest contacting someone in support at the various companies that sell them. You don't want to make any changes in the name of security that violate the TOS of any of the vendors and end up bricking your stuff. Well, I'm not sure about the TV, but the game consoles and phone are largely controlled by the vendors remotely even after you've bought them.

[hithisisatempaccount1532]

Alright thanks.

One last thing... what is the difference between Dev urandom/zero and a guttman or dod wipe? I got lost there... and how do I perform a guttman or dod wipe?

Thank you all for your support and expertise. I REALLY appreciate it.

[Kinstonian]

Alright thanks.

One last thing... what is the difference between Dev urandom/zero and a guttman or dod wipe? I got lost there... and how do I perform a guttman or dod wipe?

Thank you all for your support and expertise. I REALLY appreciate it.

If you're using a drive that was created after around 2002, then from a forensic standpoint, there isn't a difference from urandom/zero and a Gutmann wipe. If a block is overwritten, then the data is gone. The reason why governments require multiple overwrites is just in case someone somewhere somehow discovers a new method to recover data after multiple overwrites like in the past by using a special microscope.

Relatively modern drives no longer use the older encoding techniques, making many of the patterns specified by Gutmann superfluous.
...
Companies specializing in recovery from damaged media cannot recover completely overwritten files. These companies specialize in the recovery of information from media that has been damaged by fire, water or otherwise. No private data recovery company claims that it can reconstruct completely overwritten data as of now.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gutmann_method