Remove U3 from an USB flash disk

This "SanDisk Cruzer" USB flash drive has this nasty U3 thingy included. Every time it connects with a host, this U3 partition reappears and gets in the way, trying to do super smart stuff.

So, how to get rid if this malware feature? Overwriting the whole device did not help. There's a removal tool...for Windows. There's a removal tool for Macs too, but only up to MacOS 10.6 :-\

For Linux, there's u3_tool. This hasn't been updated in a while but let's hope we won't need tools like this in the future. Here's a short description to get u3_tool going:

 svn co https://u3-tool.svn.sourceforge.net/svnroot/u3-tool/trunk u3-tool-svn
 cd trunk u3-tool-svn
 aclocal
 autoconf
 automake --add-missing
 ./configure --prefix=/opt/u3-tool
 make && sudo make install
After the build completed, let's use it:
$ /opt/u3-tool/sbin/u3-tool -i -v /dev/sdb
Total device size:   1.88 GB (2017525760 bytes)
CD size:             16.00 MB (16777216 bytes)
Data partition size: 1.86 GB (2000748544 bytes)

$ /opt/u3-tool/sbin/u3-tool -p 0 -v /dev/sdb

WARNING: Loading a new cd image causes the whole device to be wiped. This INCLUDES
 the data partition.
I repeat: ANY EXISTING DATA WILL BE LOST!

Are you sure you want to continue? [yn] y

$ echo $?
0
And it worked :-) Good riddance, U3!