Applications to do a hard-drive erase per government standard DOD-5220(for usa only)

[axiomcrs]

I'd like to poll the technibble community to find what the program of choice is to do a government-certified wipe of a hard-drive. Would like to include free apps if possible.

 

[ITMAN]

killdisk... thats it, works great, dos based... done

 

[MrUnknown]

http://cmrr.ucsd.edu/people/Hughes/SecureErase.shtml

Not sure if it works to DOD standards.

 

[dbdawn]

dban is what I always use

 

[hyfidel]

I see this government standard or DoD standard mentioned in the marketing materials of many programs, however:

DoD 5220.22-M is sometimes cited as a standard for sanitization to counter data remanence. The NISPOM actually covers the entire field of government-industrial security, of which data sanitization is a very small part (about two paragraphs in a 141 page document).[4] Furthermore, the NISPOM does not actually specify any particular method. Standards for sanitization are left up to the Cognizant Security Authority. The Defense Security Service provides a Clearing and Sanitization Matrix (C&SM) which does specify methods.[5] As of the June 2007 edition of the DSS C&SM, overwriting is no longer acceptable for sanitization of magnetic media; only degaussing or physical destruction is acceptable. (Wikipedia)

Most secure erases will do what you need, but if you really need to wipe it, some thermite would be fun.

 

[pcman2010]

I use dban with the most rewrites because I'm paranoid, or a hammer.

http://www.dban.org/

 

[Alan22]

.....or a hammer.

With a few good nails