Highlights

We are hiring a Fundraising Lead. Please help us pass the word!
We made lots of progress on a complete rewrite of the Persistent Storage that implements a new design from 2021.

For example, the new Persistent Storage won't require restarting each time you activate a new feature and will make it easier to persist more settings in the future.

You can sneak peek at our experimental USB image! Don't use it for security just yet.
We did an initial deployment of Mirrorbits to handle our downloads, instead of our current custom scripts. Mirrorbits will make downloads more reliable by freeing us from some manual maintenance work when a mirror goes down, make downloads a bit faster by optimizing based on IP locations, and allow us to do stats on the number of downloads.

We also bought the domain name tails.net, so this new infra will live under https://download.tails.net/ in some weeks.
We travelled to Brazil to meet local activists, train them on Tails, and do usability test of Tor Connection and 18784.

The many fixes that we did to the installation instructions since we last tested them in December 2021 gave excellent results. All the test participants could install and start Tails pretty easily!

Releases

Tails 5.3.1 was released on August 2 (emergency release) to fix a security vulnerability in the Linux kernel.
Tails 5.4 was released on August 24.

Metrics

Tails has been started more than 765785 times this month. This makes 24703 boots a day on average.

Posted 2022-09-08

Changes and updates

Harden several aspects of our Linux kernel. (#18302, #18858, and #18886)
Disable HTTPS-only mode in the Unsafe Browser to make it easier to sign in to Wi-Fi networks.
Update Tor Browser to 11.5.2.
Update tor to 0.4.7.10.
Update the Linux kernel to 5.10.136. This should improve the support for newer hardware: graphics, Wi-Fi, and so on. It will also fix an important vulnerability (19081)

For more details, read our changelog.

Known issues

None specific to this release.

See the list of long-standing issues.

Get Tails 5.4

To upgrade your Tails USB stick and keep your persistent storage

Automatic upgrades are available from Tails 5.0 or later to 5.4.

You can reduce the size of the download of future automatic upgrades by doing a manual upgrade to the latest version.
If you cannot do an automatic upgrade or if Tails fails to start after an automatic upgrade, please try to do a manual upgrade.

To install Tails on a new USB stick

Follow our installation instructions:

The Persistent Storage on the USB stick will be lost if you install instead of upgrading.

To download only

If you don't need installation or upgrade instructions, you can download Tails 5.4 directly:

What's coming up?

Tails 5.5 is scheduled for September 20.

Have a look at our roadmap to see where we are heading to.

Posted 2022-08-24 Tags: announce

Here are some highlights of what happened in July in Tails-land:

The Management and Fundraising Teams worked on the fundraising position job description, which is now live in the website.
The new Project Manager's introductory period is over and we're all very happy with the immediate impacts of her work, which already results in better planning, organizing and communicating inside the project (see the job description above as an example). You rock, disoj! :)
The UX Team published a new footer in the website (that was in June, actually, but it's worth mentioning!).

Releases

Tails 5.2 was released on July 12 with Thunderbird 91.11.0 and Tor Browser 11.5 (based on an Extended Support Release of Firefox).

Tails 5.3 was released on July 26, based on Debian 11.4 with Linux 5.10.127, and containing Tor Browser 11.5.1 with uBlock fixed and enabled once again (broken since 5.2).

Metrics

Tails has been started more than 766861 times this month. This makes 24737 boots a day on average.

Posted 2022-08-16

This release is an emergency release to fix a security vulnerability in the Linux kernel.

Changes and updates

Update the Linux kernel to 5.10.127-2, which fixes CVE-2022-34918, a vulnerability that allows applications in Tails to gain administration privileges.

For example, if an attacker was able to exploit other unknown security vulnerabilities in Tor Browser, they might then use CVE-2022-34918 to take full control of your Tails and deanonymize you.

This attack is very unlikely, but could be performed by a strong attacker, such as a government or a hacking firm. We are not aware of this attack being used in the wild.
Update Thunderbird to 91.12.0.

Fixed problems

For more details, read our changelog.

Known issues

None specific to this release.

See the list of long-standing issues.

Get Tails 5.3.1

To upgrade your Tails USB stick and keep your persistent storage

Automatic upgrades are available from Tails 5.0 or later to 5.3.1.

You can reduce the size of the download of future automatic upgrades by doing a manual upgrade to the latest version.
If you cannot do an automatic upgrade or if Tails fails to start after an automatic upgrade, please try to do a manual upgrade.

To install Tails on a new USB stick

Follow our installation instructions:

The Persistent Storage on the USB stick will be lost if you install instead of upgrading.

To download only

If you don't need installation or upgrade instructions, you can download Tails 5.3.1 directly:

What's coming up?

Tails 5.4 is scheduled for August 23.

Have a look at our roadmap to see where we are heading to.

Posted 2022-08-02 Tags: announce

Changes and updates

Included software

Update Tor Browser to 11.5.1

Fixed problems

This section will be updated soon. Sorry for the inconvenience!

Known issues

None specific to this release.

See the list of long-standing issues.

Get Tails 5.3

To upgrade your Tails USB stick and keep your persistent storage

Automatic upgrades are available from Tails 5.0 or later to 5.3.

You can reduce the size of the download of future automatic upgrades by doing a manual upgrade to the latest version.
If you cannot do an automatic upgrade or if Tails fails to start after an automatic upgrade, please try to do a manual upgrade.

To install Tails on a new USB stick

Follow our installation instructions:

The Persistent Storage on the USB stick will be lost if you install instead of upgrading.

To download only

If you don't need installation or upgrade instructions, you can download Tails 5.3 directly:

What's coming up?

Tails 5.4 is scheduled for August 23.

Have a look at our roadmap to see where we are heading to.

Posted 2022-07-26 Tags: announce

Changes and updates

Included software

Update Tor Browser to 11.5.
Update Thunderbird to 91.11.0.

Fixed problems

For more details, read our changelog.

Known issues

None specific to this release.

See the list of long-standing issues.

Get Tails 5.2

To upgrade your Tails USB stick and keep your persistent storage

Automatic upgrades are available from Tails 5.0 or later to 5.2.

You can reduce the size of the download of future automatic upgrades by doing a manual upgrade to the latest version.
If you cannot do an automatic upgrade or if Tails fails to start after an automatic upgrade, please try to do a manual upgrade.

To install Tails on a new USB stick

Follow our installation instructions:

The Persistent Storage on the USB stick will be lost if you install instead of upgrading.

To download only

If you don't need installation or upgrade instructions, you can download Tails 5.2 directly:

What's coming up?

Tails 5.3 is scheduled for August 9.

Have a look at our roadmap to see where we are heading to.

Posted 2022-07-12 Tags: announce

Here are a few highlights about what we did in May, among many other things:

Our helpdesk email now has auto-reply (#17935).
Improved the UX of Tor Connection: people that were "exploring" the interface going back and forth used to find the wrong boxes to be automatically checked #18546
We participated in Tor hackweek. It was very fun and very useful!
- We implemented QR code scanning #18219. This seems to work, but it still isn't ready for inclusion.
- We added support for Snowflake #5494. Again, this is a PoC: it's nice to see it working, but don't expect it to be released so soon.

Releases

Tails 5.1 was released on June 4. It fixed an important security vulnerability, but it also brought many improvements, among which:

Improvements for users who leave east of UTC: Tor Connection now automatically fixes the computer clock if you choose to connect to Tor automatically; also, the time displayed in the top navigation uses the time zone selected when fixing the clock in Tor connection.
Unsafe browser got a new homepage, which makes it easier to understand how to sign in to the local network using a captive portal.

After that, Tails 5.1.1 was released on June 23 as an emergency release.

Metrics

Tails has been started more than 772283 times this month. This makes 25742 boots a day on average.

Posted 2022-07-11

This release fixes a high severity security issue in tor, that affects performance and possibly anonymity.

Changes and updates

Included software

Update tor to 0.4.7.8.
Update Thunderbird to 91.10.
Update the Linux kernel to 5.10.120. This fixes important security issues.

For more details, read our changelog.

Known issues

None specific to this release.

See the list of long-standing issues.

Get Tails 5.1.1

To upgrade your Tails USB stick and keep your persistent storage

Automatic upgrades are available from Tails 5.x.
If you cannot do an automatic upgrade or if Tails fails to start after an automatic upgrade, please try to do a manual upgrade.

To install Tails on a new USB stick

Follow our installation instructions:

The Persistent Storage on the USB stick will be lost if you install instead of upgrading.

To download only

If you don't need installation or upgrade instructions, you can download Tails 5.1.1 directly:

What's coming up?

Tails 5.2 is tentatively scheduled for July 5, but it will likely be released later than that.

Have a look at our roadmap to see where we are heading to.

Posted 2022-06-23 Tags: announce

Here are a few highlights about what we did in May, among many other things:

We implemented many improvements to the Tor Connection assistant. This makes is much easier for people in Asia to circumvent censorship. For details, see the Tails 5.1 release notes.
We wrote a new homepage for the Unsafe Browser when you are not connected to the Tor network yet. This new version makes it easier to understand how to sign in to the network using a captive portal.
We started organized training and usability tests sessions for August in Brazil.
Tails 5.0 was released on May 3. It was the first version of Tails based on Debian 11 (Bullseye) and brought new versions of a lot of the software included in Tails and new OpenPGP tools.
We started evaluating Mirrorbits to manage our download mirror pool. On top of decreasing the required maintenance work, this should make downloads of Tails faster and more reliable.
Tails has been started more than 769 997 times this month. This makes 24 838 boots a day on average.

Posted 2022-06-09

This release fixes the security vulnerability in the JavaScript engine of Firefox and Tor Browser announced on May 24.

This release was delayed from May 31 to June 5 because of a delay in the release of Tor Browser 11.0.14.

Changes and updates

Tor Connection assistant

Tails 5.1 includes many improvements to the Tor Connection assistant:

The Tor Connection assistant now automatically fixes the computer clock if you choose to connect to Tor automatically.

This makes is much easier for people in Asia to circumvent censorship.

Tails learns the current time by connecting to the captive portal detection service of Fedora, which is used by most Linux distributions. This connection does not go through the Tor network and is an exception to our policy of only making Internet connections through the Tor network.

You can learn more about our security assessment of this time synchronization in our design documentation about non-Tor traffic.
The time displayed in the top navigation uses the time zone selected when fixing the clock in the Tor Connection assistant.

In the future, we will make it possible to change the displayed time zone for everybody from the desktop (#10819) and store it in the Persistent Storage (#12094).
The last screen of the Tor Connection assistant makes it clear whether you are connected using Tor bridges or not.

Unsafe Browser and captive portals

We wrote a new homepage for the Unsafe Browser when you are not connected to the Tor network yet. This new version makes it easier to understand how to sign in to the network using a captive portal.
Tails now asks for confirmation before restarting when the Unsafe Browser was not enabled in the Welcome Screen. This prevents losing work too easily.

Kleopatra

Associate OpenPGP files with Kleopatra in the Files browser.

You can now double-click on .gpg files to decrypt them.
Add Kleopatra to the Favorites applications.

Included software

Update tor to 0.4.7.7.
Update Tor Browser to 11.0.14.
Update Thunderbird to 91.9.
Update the Linux kernel to 5.10.113. This should improve the support for newer hardware: graphics, Wi-Fi, and so on.

Fixed problems

Remove the automatic selection of the option Configure a bridge when rolling back from the option to hide that you are connecting to Tor. (#18546)
Give the same instructions on both screens where you have to configure a bridge. (#18596)
Help rename the default KeePassXC database to open it automatically in the future. (#18966)
Fix sharing files using OnionShare from the Files browser. (#18990)
Disable search providers in the Activities overview: files, calculator, and terminal. (#18952)

For more details, read our changelog.

Known issues

None specific to this release.

See the list of long-standing issues.

Get Tails 5.1

To upgrade your Tails USB stick and keep your persistent storage

Automatic upgrades are available from Tails 5.0.

You can reduce the size of the download of future automatic upgrades by doing a manual upgrade to the latest version.
If you cannot do an automatic upgrade or if Tails fails to start after an automatic upgrade, please try to do a manual upgrade.

To install Tails on a new USB stick

Follow our installation instructions:

The Persistent Storage on the USB stick will be lost if you install instead of upgrading.

To download only

If you don't need installation or upgrade instructions, you can download Tails 5.1 directly:

What's coming up?

Tails 5.2 is scheduled for June 28.

Have a look at our roadmap to see where we are heading to.

Posted 2022-06-04 Tags: announce