Secure deletion on the ext3 filesystem

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Bobo-the-Cat
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Secure deletion on the ext3 filesystem

Post by Bobo-the-Cat »

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?
Last edited by LockBot on Wed Dec 28, 2022 7:16 am, edited 1 time in total.
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grimdestripador
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Re: Secure deletion on the ext3 filesystem

Post by grimdestripador »

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.
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