Secure File Deletion
Maybe I'm looking for something that's not needed. But, I've done a bit of searching and not come up with any sort of application of this nature. I'm wondering if there is any sort of secure file shredder in Linux.
Maybe I'm looking for something that's not needed. But, I've done a bit of searching and not come up with any sort of application of this nature.
I'm wondering if there is any sort of secure file shredder in Linux. I used several different ones in Windows, including the one in PGP and Evidence Eliminator, which is an excellent security application.
One more question, as I get more comfortable with Linux. I know in Windows, history is kept on everything and anything you do. Every application opened, etc. Does this occur with Linux, as well? If so, where would this me kept? If it is, would it be safe to delete?
Okay, maybe I sound paranoid, but one of my primary reasons for switiching to Linux in the first place, was additional security features!
Regards,
zenarcher
I'm wondering if there is any sort of secure file shredder in Linux. I used several different ones in Windows, including the one in PGP and Evidence Eliminator, which is an excellent security application.
One more question, as I get more comfortable with Linux. I know in Windows, history is kept on everything and anything you do. Every application opened, etc. Does this occur with Linux, as well? If so, where would this me kept? If it is, would it be safe to delete?
Okay, maybe I sound paranoid, but one of my primary reasons for switiching to Linux in the first place, was additional security features!
Regards,
zenarcher
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Hi zenarcher,
A while back, I caught an employee downloading obscene images on our control room computer. He swears it wasn't him, but it was easy enough to hang him, in that the history on the browser showed the images were downloaded while he was in the control room at our radio station. I fired him for it.
I was, and am, concerned that if this happens again, there may be left over images of god knows what on that computer. What if the authorities do a sting operation of some sort, and there I am left holding the bag with pictures of naked underage girls on my computer! I don't know for a fact that this is what he was downloading, but what if he was!! This does concern me... I wish I knew if I clean out the picture cache in the browser if that is all that is needed, or are those images floating around somewhere else on my hard drive. I know in Windows, they are. In Linux? I just don't know.
I've looked for answers to this, but unfortunately, I've come up empty...
Not insinuating this is what you are wanting to eliminate. Just thought I'd share with you the concerns I have about this as well.
A while back, I caught an employee downloading obscene images on our control room computer. He swears it wasn't him, but it was easy enough to hang him, in that the history on the browser showed the images were downloaded while he was in the control room at our radio station. I fired him for it.
I was, and am, concerned that if this happens again, there may be left over images of god knows what on that computer. What if the authorities do a sting operation of some sort, and there I am left holding the bag with pictures of naked underage girls on my computer! I don't know for a fact that this is what he was downloading, but what if he was!! This does concern me... I wish I knew if I clean out the picture cache in the browser if that is all that is needed, or are those images floating around somewhere else on my hard drive. I know in Windows, they are. In Linux? I just don't know.
I've looked for answers to this, but unfortunately, I've come up empty...
Not insinuating this is what you are wanting to eliminate. Just thought I'd share with you the concerns I have about this as well.
Hi Dan,
Well, I can completely understand your concern with the business and you make some very good points. Legally, it's difficult to say who would be held responsible, since even the laws seem a big vague in this area. I often wonder the same thing, when I'm working on computers for individuals. It seems to me that I read somewhere, that even doing so, if you come across what may be "illegal material" on a hard drive, you are obligated to report it to the authorities. I don't, as I'm not in the law enforcement business and I'm not interested in doing their job for them, or placing myself in a position of liability.
I am well aware of the cache that Windows maintains and it's a nightmare, which is what got me thinking about Linux. As for the browser, I use Firefox and set the Cache and the History both at "0" thinking that should help. But, what other history remains in Linux is a real question, it seems. Sure wish someone would come up with some answers....sounds like it would have to come from the real Linux experts. Like you, I've done some searching and come up empty, too.
Yes, I'm not particularly concerned about [censored] and the like on my systems. But, I often do keep what I consider sensitive information, such as banking info, passwords, PIN numbers, even y safe combination and such, on the computer. Likewise, a lot of business and personal correspondence. Many years ago, I began securing this material using PGP and a 4096 bit encryption key. Often, in my paranoia, I would then even resort to steganography, to futher bury the files. Yeah, I know...I'm paranoid. Unfortunately, I worked in several African countries over the years, with secret police grabbing records and such and I was in the news business. You learn paranoia can be very, very healthy. Without getting particularly political, I'll just say I don't have any more confidence in this government than I had in several others where I've lived and worked.
Anyway, as an example, once a document is encrypted, the original is deleted, but without some sort of proper file shredding, could be recovered, making the encryption a bit of a futile effort. Same if there is some history lurking around on the hard drive.
With Windows, which I no longer use at all, I used an excellent program called, "Evidence Eliminator." I don't know if you're familiar with it or not, but it gets rid of virtually all history, above and beyond DOD standards. It will defeat Encase and other forensics file recovery software used by law enforcement. I sure wish there was something along that line for Linux.
Incidentally, I can related to your radio station concerns. I worked in many of them over the years, before the advent of computers and still, the people working there can give you an ulcer!
Regards,
zenarcher
Well, I can completely understand your concern with the business and you make some very good points. Legally, it's difficult to say who would be held responsible, since even the laws seem a big vague in this area. I often wonder the same thing, when I'm working on computers for individuals. It seems to me that I read somewhere, that even doing so, if you come across what may be "illegal material" on a hard drive, you are obligated to report it to the authorities. I don't, as I'm not in the law enforcement business and I'm not interested in doing their job for them, or placing myself in a position of liability.
I am well aware of the cache that Windows maintains and it's a nightmare, which is what got me thinking about Linux. As for the browser, I use Firefox and set the Cache and the History both at "0" thinking that should help. But, what other history remains in Linux is a real question, it seems. Sure wish someone would come up with some answers....sounds like it would have to come from the real Linux experts. Like you, I've done some searching and come up empty, too.
Yes, I'm not particularly concerned about [censored] and the like on my systems. But, I often do keep what I consider sensitive information, such as banking info, passwords, PIN numbers, even y safe combination and such, on the computer. Likewise, a lot of business and personal correspondence. Many years ago, I began securing this material using PGP and a 4096 bit encryption key. Often, in my paranoia, I would then even resort to steganography, to futher bury the files. Yeah, I know...I'm paranoid. Unfortunately, I worked in several African countries over the years, with secret police grabbing records and such and I was in the news business. You learn paranoia can be very, very healthy. Without getting particularly political, I'll just say I don't have any more confidence in this government than I had in several others where I've lived and worked.
Anyway, as an example, once a document is encrypted, the original is deleted, but without some sort of proper file shredding, could be recovered, making the encryption a bit of a futile effort. Same if there is some history lurking around on the hard drive.
With Windows, which I no longer use at all, I used an excellent program called, "Evidence Eliminator." I don't know if you're familiar with it or not, but it gets rid of virtually all history, above and beyond DOD standards. It will defeat Encase and other forensics file recovery software used by law enforcement. I sure wish there was something along that line for Linux.
Incidentally, I can related to your radio station concerns. I worked in many of them over the years, before the advent of computers and still, the people working there can give you an ulcer!
Regards,
zenarcher
Originally posted by zenarcher:
Quote: You learn paranoia can be very, very healthy.Paranoid people make the best drivers and live longer generally...
Quote:Without getting particularly political, I'll just say I don't have any more confidence in this government than I had in several others where I've lived and worked.I'll go you one further. I have NO confidence in the Federal government whatsoever. It doesn't matter which party is in office, by and large, they're gonna do everything in their power to make you life as complicated, and as miserable as they can.
Quote:Incidentally, I can related to your radio station concerns. I worked in many of them over the years, before the advent of computers and still, the people working there can give you an ulcer!As you know, radio is like no other business. One good thing about it though, it's almost as if computers were specifically designed for the broadcast industry. There are so many ways they are useful from on-air automation systems right down to the business office. We run five computers all networked on a wired LAN. Three boxes run Fedora, one runs DOS and the other runs the Evil OS.
Quote: You learn paranoia can be very, very healthy.Paranoid people make the best drivers and live longer generally...
Quote:Without getting particularly political, I'll just say I don't have any more confidence in this government than I had in several others where I've lived and worked.I'll go you one further. I have NO confidence in the Federal government whatsoever. It doesn't matter which party is in office, by and large, they're gonna do everything in their power to make you life as complicated, and as miserable as they can.
Quote:Incidentally, I can related to your radio station concerns. I worked in many of them over the years, before the advent of computers and still, the people working there can give you an ulcer!As you know, radio is like no other business. One good thing about it though, it's almost as if computers were specifically designed for the broadcast industry. There are so many ways they are useful from on-air automation systems right down to the business office. We run five computers all networked on a wired LAN. Three boxes run Fedora, one runs DOS and the other runs the Evil OS.
Well, Dan, I'm 60 years old and I still ride my motorcycle every day, so paranoid works. Not a scratch on me or the bike.
As for confidence in government and political parties, I completely agree. All are about power...and power means they must control...right down to the very actions within your own private home. I figure it's my duty to protect myself, even if that means from government intrusion.
What I would have given for computers in a radio station! At one time, I was Sr. News Editor for a government owned radio service in southern Africa. My office and newsroom was in the Parliament building. As you might imagine, weather and utilities are both unreliable in that part of the world. "Emergency lighting" translated into a box of candles. "Backup power" translated into a small portable generator, capable of running wire service machines...sitting on the floor of the newsroom, spitting out carbon monoxide throughout the room. All I had were manual typewriters and replacement ribbons were scarce. Sometimes, reading a newscast required some imagination and ad-libbing, when the type faded out. Ah, the luxuries of technology!
Regards,
zenarcher
As for confidence in government and political parties, I completely agree. All are about power...and power means they must control...right down to the very actions within your own private home. I figure it's my duty to protect myself, even if that means from government intrusion.
What I would have given for computers in a radio station! At one time, I was Sr. News Editor for a government owned radio service in southern Africa. My office and newsroom was in the Parliament building. As you might imagine, weather and utilities are both unreliable in that part of the world. "Emergency lighting" translated into a box of candles. "Backup power" translated into a small portable generator, capable of running wire service machines...sitting on the floor of the newsroom, spitting out carbon monoxide throughout the room. All I had were manual typewriters and replacement ribbons were scarce. Sometimes, reading a newscast required some imagination and ad-libbing, when the type faded out. Ah, the luxuries of technology!
Regards,
zenarcher
In theory you can recover any data that has been deleted and the goverement is very proficient in doing so. I've seen data recovered from Drives that were formated clean. The only way to really get rid of data is to use a low level wipe tool which will format then overwrite the disk with 1's and 0's (the gov standard is seven passes) other that that I don't know any other way.
cat $filename > /dev/null may be better than rm $filename? I dunno?? I doubt it.
cat $filename > /dev/null may be better than rm $filename? I dunno?? I doubt it.
That's exactly the way that Evidence Eliminator works for Windows. It overwrites 0 and !'s...then, random overwrites. It's been shown to defeat literally any forensics software or data recovery system. I've always been highly impressed with the way it works with Windows. Wouldn't have a Windows machine without it.It goes through the entire system, so is quite efficient. Of course, it sells for $150.00, so you expect it to do something right.
A lot of people aren't familiar with the program, but if they are security conscious, they should be. You can check out how it works and what it does at:
http://www.evidence-eliminator.com/product.d2w
zenarcher
A lot of people aren't familiar with the program, but if they are security conscious, they should be. You can check out how it works and what it does at:
http://www.evidence-eliminator.com/product.d2w
zenarcher
Since installing SUSE 9.3 Pro, I've found a shredder for files, at any rate. When I installed KGpg for my file encryption, I had an option to put a shredder on the desktop. Kind of different, how it works. You merely drag a file (won't do an entire folder) to the shredder icon on the desktop and it is shredded. KGpg does 39 passes, for shredding, so should be well beyond DOD standards, I would think. Of course, that still doesn't address what is kept by Linux as far as history files, but it's sure a step in the right direction and way ahead of merely emptying the Trash Bin.
zenarcher
zenarcher
