...was gifted a laptop, was thinking of wiping and reformating to a beginner-friendly Linux setup - from a privacy standpoint, I was told I could not reformat "fully," that only "professionals" can.

[I took classes in unix almost 20 years ago and did not keep up. I consider myself "beginner" status.]

Was given a laptop a friend bought from someone online. It supposedly has a Linux set up with a Windows partition & they said they couldn't get to it, but then again, they don't have much Linux experience either.

I don't know who it came from and would rather make sure it's not a set up to take information, such as …

laptop linux privacy professionals thinking wiping