Amnesic Incognito Live System
Tails is a live system that aims to preserve your privacy and anonymity. It helps you to use the Internet anonymously and circumvent censorship almost anywhere you go and on any computer but leaving no trace unless you ask it to explicitly. It is a complete operating system designed to be used from a DVD, USB stick, or SD card independently of the computer’s original operating system. It is Free Software and based on Debian GNU/Linux.
Tails comes with several built-in applications pre-configured with security in mind: web browser, instant messaging client, email client, office suite, image and sound editor, etc.
Use anywhere – Leave no trace
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Using Tails on a computer doesn’t alter or depend on the operating system installed on it. So you can use it in the same way on your computer, a friend’s computer, or one at your local library. After shutting down Tails, the computer will start again with its usual operating system.
Tails is configured with special care to not use the computer’s hard-disks, even if there is some swap space on them. The only storage space used by Tails is in RAM, which is automatically erased when the computer shuts down. So you won’t leave any trace on the computer either of the Tails system itself or what you used it for. That’s why we call Tails “amnesic”.
This allows you to work with sensitive documents on any computer and protects you from data recovery after shutdown. Of course, you can still explicitly save specific documents to another USB stick or external hard-disk and take them away for future use.
State-of-the-art cryptographic tools
Tails comes with a selection of tools to protect your data using strong encryption:
Encrypt your USB sticks or external hard-disks using LUKS, the Linux standard for disk-encryption.
Automatically use HTTPS to encrypt all your communications to a number of major websites using HTTPS Everywhere, a Firefox extension developed by the Electronic Frontier Foundation.
Encrypt and sign your emails and documents using the de facto standard OpenPGPeither from Tails email client, text editor or file browser.
Protect your instant messaging conversations using OTR, a cryptographic tool that provides encryption, authentication and deniability.
Securely delete your files and clean your diskspace using Nautilus Wipe.
Online anonymity and censorship circumvention
Tails relies on the Tor anonymity network to protect your privacy online:
all software is configured to connect to the Internet through Tor
if an application tries to connect to the Internet directly, the connection is automatically blocked for security.
Tor is an open and distributed network that helps defend against traffic analysis, a form of network surveillance that threatens personal freedom and privacy, confidential business activities and relationships, and state security.
Tor protects you by bouncing your communications around a network of relays run by volunteers all around the world: it prevents somebody watching your Internet connection from learning what sites you visit, and it prevents the sites you visit from learning your physical location.
Using Tor you can:
be anonymous online by hiding your location,
connect to services that would be censored otherwise;
resist attacks that block the usage of Tor using circumvention tools such as bridges.
If using Tor is dangerous in your country
The Tor Project’s documentation on bridges mainly focuses on censorship circumvention: when using Tor is blocked by censorship. If using Tor is dangerous or considered suspicious in your country, then there are some extra rules that you should follow in order to prevent yourself from being identified as a Tor user.
Bridges are important tools that work in many cases but they are not absolute protection against all techniques that an adversary could do to identify Tor users.
Always start Tails in bridge mode.
Only use obfuscated bridges since they are harder to identify than other bridges.
The less publicly known the bridges are, the better. Unfortunately, since some bridge addresses can be obtained by anyone from the Tor website or by email, it is also possible for an adversary to get the same bridge information by the same means. The Tor Project has some protection against that, but they are far from being perfect.
So the best is if you can find a trusted friend or an organisation in a different country who runs a “private” obfuscated bridge for you. In this case “private” means that the bridge is configured with the option PublishServerDescriptor 0. Without this option The Tor Project will learn about the bridge and may distribute its address to others and so it could end up in the hands of your adversary.
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Requirements
Tails should work on any reasonably recent computer:
Either an internal or external DVD reader or the possibility to boot from a USB stick or SD card.
Tails requires an x86 compatible processor: IBM PC compatible and others but not PowerPC nor ARM. Mac computers are IBM PC compatible since 2006.
2 GB of RAM to work smoothly. Tails is known to work with less memory but you might experience strange behaviours or crashes.
Trust is a very problematic issue, and that’s the essence of why security is difficult in every field, including computers and Internet communication. Do you trust Tails and its developers? Do you think there are planted backdoors in Tails or that Tails generate compromised encryption keys in order to enable the government to spy on you?
No matter what your opinion is in this matter you should ask yourself how you reached your conclusion. Both trust and distrust need to be established based on facts, not gut feelings, paranoid suspicion, unfounded hearsay, or our word. Of course, Tails claim to be honest, but written assurances are worthless. In order to make an informed decision you must look at the greater picture of what Tails is comprised of, affiliations, and possibly how others trust this system.
Even though try hard to offer good tools to protect your privacy while using a computer, there is no magic or perfect solution to such a complex problem. Understanding well the limits of such tools is a crucial step to, first, decide whether Tails is the right tool for you, and second, make a good use of it.
Tails does not protect against compromised hardware
Tails can be compromised if installed or plugged in untrusted systems
Tails does not protect against BIOS or firmware attacks
Tor exit nodes can eavesdrop on communications
Tails makes it clear that you are using Tor and probably Tails
Man-in-the-middle attacks
Confirmation attacks
Tails doesn’t encrypt your documents by default
Tails doesn’t clear the metadata of your documents for you and doesn’t encrypt the Subject: and other headers of your encrypted e-mail messages
Tor doesn’t protect you from a global adversary
Tails doesn’t magically separate your different contextual identities
Tails doesn’t make your crappy passwords stronger
Tails is a work in progress
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