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Forums › Desktop computing › How To completely and safely erase files on hard drive before selling or disposing
silverbirch

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#95061 25-Dec-2011 23:14
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I'm thinking I can use a Linux live CD to safely erase files on a friends old hard drive before she disposes of it.  I've been googling, and most references I've found are for Ubuntu.  I have various Knoppix and Pclinuxos and probably other Linux.

Any pointers greatly appreciated.




"Dance among the moonbeams, feel the magic in the air".

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MackinNZ
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  #561465 25-Dec-2011 23:36
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I usually use DBAN for this purpose.

http://www.dban.org/   



Ragnor
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  #561468 26-Dec-2011 00:26
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+1 for dban

silverbirch

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  #561541 26-Dec-2011 14:32
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OK - thank you.




"Dance among the moonbeams, feel the magic in the air".

Registered Linux user #386597 http://counter.li.org/



tatbaird
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  #561984 27-Dec-2011 21:25
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Take your HDD to Afghanistan, get an extremist nutjob to blow the crap out of it. You'd prob get loads for it on Trademe. Wink




Well let me just quote the late-great Colonel Sanders, who said "Im too drunk to taste this chicken." -Ricky Bobby

ObidiahSlope
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  #562009 27-Dec-2011 22:38
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If you format the drive it removes all the old references to files on the drive. The raw data is still there and may be accessible by someone using a file restore program. It is safest to overwrite the drive.

In Linux you can overwrite the drive with zeros or gibberish from the command line when logged in as root.

dd if=/dev/random of=/dev/sda #write random gibberish to drive

or

dd if=dev/zero of=/dev/sda #write zeros to the drive

When dd is working it gives no feed-back on progress, so don't panic if there is no progress reported. It will tell you when it is finished.

Running cfdisk before dd will help you identify the correct device name for the drive.




Obsequious hypocrite

mattwnz
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  #562016 27-Dec-2011 23:00
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I created some truecrypt volumes on a drive and then deleted them. I beleive that is a possible option if you don't want to format the drive.

 
 
 
 

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tardtasticx
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  #562023 27-Dec-2011 23:48
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Crack open the drive, cover the disk inside in scratches and all sorts, completely ruin it. Then throw the other parts out.

johnrambo
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  #569394 16-Jan-2012 12:08
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I've tried using Eraser with Windows and it seems to work well.


Predated
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  #569398 16-Jan-2012 12:20
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Shred it



[Moderator edit (MF): folks, just use the YouTube tags to insert videos, please]
 

ferg_nz
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  #569442 16-Jan-2012 13:36
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At the Office on our Ex-Lease machines before they go i use http://sourceforge.net/projects/dban/ nice and easy

silverbirch

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  #569477 16-Jan-2012 14:38
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I used Knoppix 3.9 and the dd command.  It took hours but seems to have worked.  Going to pick up computer to put Windows back on it this week.  Thanks all for the responses.




"Dance among the moonbeams, feel the magic in the air".

Registered Linux user #386597 http://counter.li.org/

 
 
 
 

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xlanted
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  #573279 25-Jan-2012 20:22
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DBan for me also
 

kyhwana2
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  #573285 25-Jan-2012 20:37
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+1 for dban

naggyman
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  #573442 26-Jan-2012 09:30
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From what I can understand DBAN writes over all of the information in the drive several times using scrambled 0s and 1s. It makes it almost completely impossible to recover the information, even using advanced techniques.




Morgan French-Stagg

 

morgan.french.net.nz

 

 

silverbirch

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  #573490 26-Jan-2012 10:53
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I believe that's what the Linux command does also.

Thanks for your help and ideas. 




"Dance among the moonbeams, feel the magic in the air".

Registered Linux user #386597 http://counter.li.org/

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