Home / ubuntu / Questions / 1383942
In Process
Nav
Asked: 2021-12-28 00:05:12 +0800 CST

How to delete recoverable files?

  • 772

I see a lot of posts about how to recover deleted files. But I'm asking about how to make sure that deleted files are un-recoverable. On an HDD and/or SSD. Sometimes we end up doing a delete instead of a shred, and need to ensure that nobody can access the file if the device is stolen or lost.

This would basically follow the steps:

  1. Search for recoverable files.
  2. Overwrite them with zeroes or random bits.

Any way to do this?

Reason: It is just not practical to do a full disk/partition wipe or even a free space wipe for every time I want to get rid of a few recoverable files that I deleted instead of remembering to shred it. Even if an encrypted partition is used, the files would be recoverable by anyone who has access to the password, or can guess or brute-force the password.

20.04

1 Answers

  1. All I'm asking for, is a software that can detect a recoverable file and overwrite some of the bits of the file

    I don't think this is possible.

    The file is still on the disk, but you deleted the information where the file is located. So a software does not know what to delete.

    There could be a software to search and locate the file, then wipe only this part. If the file is located in the beginning of the empty space, that could speed up the process a lot. But you need information what the file looks like (have parts of the content or a duplicate to compare, etc.).

    Anyways, I don't know of a software like that.

    Testdisks photorec can locate files (not a specific though). Instead of recovering, it could also delete the finds if there was an option to do so.

    To prevent situations like this, the best option would be to use Full Disk Encryption.

    • 1