Deleting Private Data from Your Linux/Microsoft Windows Machine

Novell Cool Solutions: Tip
By Damian Myerscough

Digg This - Slashdot This Posted: 3 Dec 2007

Problem:

Private data can still be recovered when you format your Linux/Microsoft Windows machine.

Solution:

There are two possible solutions. The first solution is using the dd command:

dd if=/dev/urandom of=/dev/sda

This command will overwrite the data stored on the /dev/sda partition with random junk, however, there is a disadvantage with using the dd command and that is the speed that it takes to overwriting the data. The second solution is to use the shred command:

shred -v -n 1 /dev/sda

This will overwrite the data on the /dev/sda partition with random junk and at a much faster speed.

Environment:

SUSE Enterprise Linux Desktop 10

• SUSE Enterprise Linux Server 10
• SUSE Enterprise Linux Desktop 10 SP1
• SUSE Enterprise Linux Server 10 SP1

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