Comment 1 for bug 279598

Thank you for opening this bug and helping make Ubuntu better.

Indeed. From coreutils 5.x to 6.0 shred moved from an internal PRNG to /dev/urandom (i.e., the system PRNG). It seems this move is most probably the reason for the new high time. I am trying to get some times from the execution of shred to confirm.

If this is indeed the case (and I think it is, but I am still to query upstream on that) I do not think there is much for us to do. Perhaps using Fortuna (see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fortuna_(PRNG)) as the PRNG might make a difference.