Linux Mint Forums

I understand that it may not be possible to securely delete a file from the ext3 filesystem, because the filesystem is journalled. I have read somewhere that it may depend on the options used when the filesystem is mounted , i.e those in fstab. I have looked at this file and Linux Mint does not appear to be using the "journalled" option. Is there a Mint technical expert that could definitely confirm what the situation is here?

What I want to be able to do is to ensure that if I delete a file, say using the "wipe -fri" command which overwrites the file 35 times, that this file can NEVER be recovered. If there is jornalling - can this switched off or reset if it would allow the file to be recovered?

Yes there is journalizing. And yes your document may be swapped and later retreived.

The secure option is to mount a TrueCrypt container file and use that as your secure HD. You could then format it ext2 to prevent journalizing.