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Uses new Rust 2024

0.1.1	Jul 31, 2025
0.1.0	Jul 31, 2025

#178 in Security

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GPL-3.0 license

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FileWipe (`fw-rs`)

fw is a forensic-grade file destruction utility for securely overwriting and deleting files/directories.

⚠️ Critical Security Warning

No software tool can guarantee perfect data erasure on modern hardware. You must understand the limitations:

SSDs: SSDs use wear-leveling algorithms. When you "overwrite" a file, the drive's controller may write the new data to a different physical location.
Journaling Filesystems: Filesystems keep metadata logs and may have copies of your file's data stored in the journal.

For wiping data on magnetic media or in controlled environments, fw is a powerful tool. For absolute, guaranteed data destruction on modern drives, the only certain method is physical destruction. For SSDs, consider using firmware-level commands like ATA Secure Erase.

Features

Multiple Sanitization Methods: Choose your level of paranoia.
- default: A strong and fast 3-pass overwrite with cryptographically secure random data.
- dod-5220.22-m: A 7-pass method compliant with the U.S. Department of Defense standard.
- gutmann: The legendary 35-pass method designed to defeat even advanced hardware recovery techniques on older magnetic drives.
Concurrency: Uses a thread pool to wipe multiple files simultaneously using all your CPU cores.
Security First:
- Refuses to operate on symbolic links to prevent accidental data loss.
- Identifies and refuses to touch special device files.
- Uses OsRng for a cryptographically secure source of randomness.
Anti-Forensics: Obfuscates file size and renames files to random strings before unlinking to erase metadata.

Installation

Install directly from crates.io:

cargo install fw-rs

Make sure ~/.cargo/bin is in your PATH.

Usage

The command is fw.

Wipe a single file with default settings:

fw /path/to/sensitive-document.txt

Wipe multiple files using the DoD method with 8 threads and verbose output:

fw -j 8 --method dod-5220.22-m --verbose report.docx spreadsheet.xlsx plans.pdf

Recursively and forcibly wipe an entire directory: WARNING: This is extremely destructive. Use with extreme caution.

fw --recursive --force /path/to/project-to-be-erased/

See all available options:

fw --help

Wipe Methods Explained

Method	Passes	Description
`default`	3	A fast and secure 3-pass overwrite with CSPRNG random data. A solid balance of speed and security for most use cases.
`dod-5220.22-m`	7	Implements the DoD 5220.22-M standard. Uses passes of zeros, ones, and random data with verification. A common choice for compliance.
`gutmann`	35	The most extreme software-based method. Uses a complex sequence of patterns. Largely overkill for modern drives but a recognized standard.

License

This project is licensed under the GPL-3.0 License.

Contributing

Contributions, bug reports, and pull requests are welcome. Please open an issue in the repository to discuss any changes.

Dependencies

~2.1–3MB
~52K SLoC