The easiest way is to install GParted and use it: sudo apt-get install gpartedĬhoose your device in the upper-right corner list. sudo shred -v -n1 -z /dev/sdXĪfter this, you would have to repartition the device.

You can also set all bits to zero after the last iteration by adding the option -z, I prefer to do this. This might take a while, depending on the size of your external hard drive (I think it takes twenty minutes or so for my 4 GB flash drive). You can add the option -n N to only do this N times, to save time on large capacity devices. This will overwrite all the blocks on the device with random data three times, the -v flag is for verbose and will print the current progress. Then run the following, replacing /dev/sdX with the name of your device: sudo shred -v /dev/sdX Unmount all currently mounted partitions on that device, if any. Make sure it is the correct device, picking the wrong device will wipe it. You can use sudo fdisk -l to list all connected storage devices, and find your external hard drive there. This might be something like /dev/sdb or /dev/hdb (but not like /dev/sdb1, that's a partition). There's a command-line utility called shred, which overwrites data in a file or a whole device with random bits, making it nearly impossible to recover.įirst of all, you need to identify the name of the device.

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