Gus Wirth wrote: > At 10:47 03/14/2005 -0800, Stewart Stremler wrote: > >begin quoting gossamer axe as of Mon, Mar 14, 2005 at 08:14:23AM -0800: > >> If I remember correctly, I used to read these files I found on old > >> BBSes, The Sysops had some sort of program or DOS batch file that > >> would format the hard drive with a command, in case the FBI was after > >> them for their Pirate BBSes. Maybe a little paranoia mixed in there > >> too =] > > > >nohup sudo dd if=/dev/random of=/dev/hda & exit > > > >-Stewart "Not tried it. Ought to try it. Surely it'll work?" Stremler > > This doesn't work the way you want. dd will write starting from the front > of the disk. It will overwrite something that the system needs which then > causes a crash before the disk is wiped, thus leaving recoverable data on > the disk.
Have you actually tried that? dd already has the libraryies it needs loaded. /dev/random is already opened, so removing it won't harm anything. You may run into problems if the system has to access a swapped-ou process after the swap partition/file has been obliterated. Anyone want to test a theory at the next Linux Lab? -john -- [email protected] http://www.kernel-panic.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/kplug-list
