secure file deletion

[Werner Koch]

On Thu, 15 Feb 2001, Stephan F. Yaraghchi wrote:

> Playing around with GnuPG I noticed that there's no option
> for secure file deletion, like the "-w" command in PGP.

The -w does anyway not work under Unix or Windows.  It is not the job
of GnuPG to delete files.  That's Unix philosophy.

> Does anyone made up a workaround?
> What's necessary to securely 'wipe' a file?

Secure file deletion is a very tough problem.  The only working
solution is to use a filesystem feature.  Trying to work around will
give soon trouble when you change the filesystem (e.g. from ext2 to
Reiser): you believe the file is securly deleted but it is not.

  Werner

-- 
Werner Koch                                              <wk@gnupg.org>
GNU Privacy Guard                                (http://www.gnupg.org)
Free Software Foundation Europe              (http://www.fsfeurope.org)
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