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I need to pull about 13GB worth of data off my Ubuntu 16.04 box. I'm running xfce via Recovery mode. When I plug in my usb drive it mounts as read-only. So I do:

$ df -h
...
/dev/sdb3 ... /media/user/backup_drive

$ sudo umount /dev/sdb3

$ sudo mount -o rw,users,umask=000 /dev/sdb3 /media/user

These commands succeed. If I cd into /media/user I can see the files on the drive. But if I try to modify the file system in any way I get a permissions denied error. For example:

$ cd /media/user
$ touch newfile
touch: cannot touch 'newfile': Read-only file system
$ sudo touch newfile
touch: cannot touch 'newfile': Read-only file system

If from the xfce desktop I right-click on the volume icon and select Properties I see this:

Owner: 99
Access: Read & Write
Group: 99
Access: Read & Write
Others: Read only

Is it the "Others" permissions that's causing me grief? Any suggestions would be much appreciated.

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    Please have a look at these links, one of them might help or at least explain what is happening, askubuntu.com/questions/884562/unable-to-access-sd-card/… ; askubuntu.com/questions/144852/…
    – sudodus
    Jul 29, 2017 at 15:37
  • If you check the instructions in those links you'd see that I am doing the exact same things here.
    – RobertJoseph
    Jul 29, 2017 at 15:39
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    Then the problem might be that the drive itself is read-only. Try the tips listed in the paragraph 'The drive is read-only' in the second link (in my previous comment).
    – sudodus
    Jul 29, 2017 at 15:43
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    Well, then I suggest that you solve the acute problem with another [live] OS. Later on we can start debugging the problem with Ubuntu. (It could be that the drive or the USB system is disturbed by something.)
    – sudodus
    Jul 29, 2017 at 15:46
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    Use my pathlld tool github.com/waltinator/pathlld.git - Bash script to answer "Why can't I read/write that file?"
    – waltinator
    Jul 29, 2017 at 16:20

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