How To Wipe Volume

[sophiaya]

Wipe Volume can erase the data on the volume completely and ensure that the data can not be recovered by any data recovery solution. But how?

[rubberman]

Boot just about any Linux Live CD/DVD. Assuming that the disc is the system drive (/dev/sda), you would do this once you have booted the disc and logged in (as root):
[code]
dd if=/dev/zero of=/dev/sda bs=1M
[/code]
This will erase your drive 1MB at a time until it is totally wiped. You can use greater or lesser values for 'bs', but I have found from experience that 1M (1 megabyte == 1024x1024 bytes) is the "sweet spot" for performance on most current gear.

WARNING! This will totally erase the drive, including the partition table and boot record! Use with caution!!!

[LaxLoafer]

dd if=/dev/zero of=/dev/sda bs=1M

Simply filling a drive with null characters is insufficient to prevent data from being recovered. The process of sanitizing a disk properly invovles slightly more work.

Standards such as HIPAA set out specific requirements for sanitizing hard drives. A typical requirement is to set all bits to 1s, then 0s, followed by overwriting with a random value.

[mjdodd]

Expose the hard drive to a very strong magnetic field (put it close to car starter motor,) that will really erase anything on the disc (and probably need a manufacturers deep re format!