Error when formatting flash drive: read-only

Question

I got this error when trying to format a USB flash drive using GParted.

Error formatting volume

  Error wiping device: Command-line `wipefs -a "/dev/sdb1"'   
  exited with non-zero exit status 1: wipefs: error: /dev/sdb1:   
  probing initialization failed: Read-only file system  
  (udisks-error-quark, 0)

Answer 1

Maybe wipefs failed because the USB flash drive is mounted. Run lsblk to check whether the flash drive is mounted, and run this command to unmount it if needed:

sudo umount /dev/sdb1

Then try to format the flash drive in GParted again.