New features

• Add curl, a command line tool to download over HTTPS, FTP, and other protocols.

  curl can be useful for online investigations as an alternative to wget.

  Everything you do with curl goes through the Tor network. If you want to use curl on a local network, use /usr/bin/curl instead.

Changes and updates

• Use LUKS2 by default for all new Persistent Storage and LUKS encrypted volumes. LUKS2 provide stronger cryptography by default.

  We will provide a migration plan from LUKS1 to LUKS2 for existing Persistent Storage in Tails 5.14 (early June).

• Update Tor Browser to 12.0.6.

Fixed problems

For more details, read our changelog.

Known issues

None specific to this release.

See the list of long-standing issues.

Get Tails 5.13

To upgrade your Tails USB stick and keep your persistent storage

• Automatic upgrades are available from Tails 5.0 or later to 5.13.

  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:

• Install from Windows
• Install from macOS
• Install from Linux
• Install from Debian or Ubuntu using the command line and GnuPG

To download only

If you don't need installation or upgrade instructions, you can download Tails 5.13 directly:

• For USB sticks (USB image)
• For DVDs and virtual machines (ISO image)

Highlights

• Radically Open Security audited the security of the new Persistent Storage, our migration to Wayland, and the Unsafe Browser.

  We already started releasing fixes to the issues that they identified. We will publish more about this audit and our mitigation plans in the coming months.

• We analyzed the usability tests of the Persistent Storage done in March in Ecuador.

• We applied to the Spyware Accountability Initiative to improve Tails for the journalists who use Tails to investigate and report on spyware or protect themselves from spyware in sensitive data.

• Our entire team gathered in Paris, France to discuss internal matters, financial and product strategy.

Releases

Tails 5.12 was released on April 19.

It fixes many usability and reliability issues in the new Persistent Storage:

• After you turn off a feature of the Persistent Storage, you can now click the Delete Data button to delete the data stored for this feature.

• When creating the Persistent Storage, a random and very secure passphrase is now displayed as a suggestion, using the diceware technique.

• Use a new icon for the backup utility for the Persistent Storage.

• Improve the error message when a feature of the Persistent Storage fails to activate from the Welcome Screen to clarify which feature is affected.

• Make the activation of the Persistent Storage more reliable in 2 error cases. (#19376 and #19331)

• Add a progress indicator while turning on a new feature to clarify that it can take some time. (#19291)

• Make sure that all data that is already available in Tails is really copied to the USB stick when turning on a feature. (#19368)

Metrics

Tails has been started more than 724 299 times this month. This makes 24 143 boots a day on average.

New features

Data deletion when deactivating a feature of the Persistent Storage

After you turn off a feature of the Persistent Storage, you can now click the Delete Data button to delete the data stored for this feature.

Passphrase suggestion when creating the Persistent Storage

When creating the Persistent Storage, a random and very secure passphrase is now displayed as a suggestion:

This passphrase uses the diceware method to give very strong security guarantees while being possible to memorize.

For example, a six-word passphrase like we suggest would take 3 505 years to crack at a trillion guesses a second.

Learn more about the maths in The Intercept: Passphrases That You Can Memorize — But That Even the NSA Can’t Guess.

Changes and updates

• Update Tor Browser to 12.0.5.

• Update the Linux kernel to 6.1.20. This improves the support for newer hardware: graphics, Wi-Fi, and so on.

• Use a new icon for the backup utility for the Persistent Storage.

  

Fixed problems

We fixed several reliability issues with the Persistent Storage:

• We improved the error message when a feature of the Persistent Storage fails to activate from the Welcome Screen to clarify which feature is affected.

  

  After starting Tails, the feature that failed to activate is marked as such in the Persistent Storage settings. You can try turning the feature off and on again or deleting its data to reset it entirely.

  

• We made the activation of the Persistent Storage more reliable in 2 error cases. (#19376 and #19331)

• We added a progress indicator while turning on a new feature to clarify that it can take some time. (#19291)

• We made sure that all data that is already available in Tails is really copied to the USB stick when turning on a feature. (#19368)

For more details, read our changelog.

Known issues

None specific to this release.

See the list of long-standing issues.

Get Tails 5.12

To upgrade your Tails USB stick and keep your persistent storage

• Automatic upgrades are available from Tails 5.0 or later to 5.12.

  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:

• Install from Windows
• Install from macOS
• Install from Linux
• Install from Debian or Ubuntu using the command line and GnuPG

To download only

If you don't need installation or upgrade instructions, you can download Tails 5.12 directly:

• For USB sticks (USB image)
• For DVDs and virtual machines (ISO image)

Highlights

We got in touch with the journalists that reported how feminists in Mexico were spied by the army: https://nocallaronlasolas.serendipia.digital/.

We improved Persistent Storage behavior and UX in corner-cases (!1010).

We have started tests of the new Persistent Storage. As you might remember, there was a big revamp in Tails 5.8. The new implementation has been designed to have a smoother UI.

Releases

Tails 5.11 was released on March 20:

it improves performance on low-memory systems, and improves your ability to record screencasts.

Metrics

Tails has been started more than 740000 times this month. This makes 23884 boots a day on average.

New features

• Tails now uses the zram Linux kernel module to extend the capacity of the computer's memory.

  You can run more applications or use your session for longer periods of time. Tails will handle more load before freezing and become slow more progressively.

• You can record screencasts using the integrated feature of GNOME. We configured this feature to allow unlimited screencasts. See screenshot and screencast.

Changes and updates

• Update Tor Browser to 12.0.4.

• Update Thunderbird to 102.9.0.

• Redesigned the unlocking section of the Welcome Screen.

  

For more details, read our changelog.

Known issues

None specific to this release.

See the list of long-standing issues.

Get Tails 5.11

To upgrade your Tails USB stick and keep your persistent storage

• Automatic upgrades are available from Tails 5.0 or later to 5.11.

  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:

• Install from Windows
• Install from macOS
• Install from Linux
• Install from Debian or Ubuntu using the command line and GnuPG

To download only

If you don't need installation or upgrade instructions, you can download Tails 5.11 directly:

• For USB sticks (USB image)
• For DVDs and virtual machines (ISO image)

What's coming up?

Tails 5.12 is scheduled for April 18.

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

Highlights

• @bokonon joined our team, as our Fundraising Lead. bokonon will help us develop and grow our fundraising initiatives, to support the work we do to accomplish our mission.

• We prepared usability tests planned in Ecuador in March.

Releases

We released Tails 5.10 on February 16.

As part of our focus on polishing user experience, Tails now asks for confirmation when starting without unlocking the Persistent Storage. Because we humans sometimes forget stuff. It's OK :)

Tails 5.10 fixed a few problems introduced in Tails 5.8 in December, and some more:

• Fixed another case of Persistent Storage not activating. (#19432)

• Avoid opening the Persistent Storage settings each time after login. (#19410)

• Solve a possible privilege escalation through a symlink attack.

Metrics

Tails has been started more than 652 918 times this month. This makes 23 318 boots a day on average.

Changes and updates

• Update Tor Browser to 12.0.3.

• Ask for confirmation when starting without unlocking the Persistent Storage.

  

• Update our documentation on the Persistent Storage.

Fixed problems

• Avoid crashing when the download of an upgrade is stopped and resumed. (#18435)

• Solve a possible privilege escalation through a symlink attack. (#19424)

  Dennis Brinkrolf discovered that an adversary who could already run arbitrary code as the amnesia user in Tails 5.9, could have escalated their privileges to reading arbitrary files on the system. It might have been possible to use this as part of an exploit chain to gain root privileges.

Persistent Storage

• Avoid opening the Persistent Storage settings each time after login. (#19410)

• Solve some cases of failure to activate the Persistent Storage by bumping the unlocking timeout to 120 seconds. (#19432)

For more details, read our changelog.

Known issues

None specific to this release.

See the list of long-standing issues.

Get Tails 5.10

To upgrade your Tails USB stick and keep your persistent storage

• Automatic upgrades are available from Tails 5.0 or later to 5.10.

  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:

• Install from Windows
• Install from macOS
• Install from Linux
• Install from Debian or Ubuntu using the command line and GnuPG

To download only

If you don't need installation or upgrade instructions, you can download Tails 5.10 directly:

• For USB sticks (USB image)
• For DVDs and virtual machines (ISO image)

What's coming up?

Tails 5.11 is scheduled for March 14.

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

Highlights

• We agreed internally on strategic goals for the new 3 years.

  In terms of product strategy, we will focus on learning about existing users who match our personas and how to serve them better. We will focus less on acquiring new users from our target audience.

  In terms of features, we will prioritize better interoperability with tools like mobile messaging apps, online video calls, and social media.

• We updated our documentation to the new Persistent Storage and added a page about opening your Persistent Storage from another operating system.

• We made Tails Upgrader use our new pool of mirrors at https://download.tails.net/ instead of our previous custom solution.

Releases

Tails 5.9 was released on January 23.

It fixed most of the regressions introduced in Tails 5.8 in December:

• Fixed support for some graphics cards.

• Fixed starting AppImages that use the Qt toolkit like Feather and Bitcoin-Qt. (#19326)

• Fixed clipboard encryption and decryption in Kleopatra. (#19329)

• Fixed at least 2 cases of Persistent Storage not activating:

  • When activation takes longer (#19347)

  • When the Dotfiles feature includes symbolic links (#19346)

• Fixed 3 clipboard operations with KeePassXC.

Metrics

Tails has been started more than 713 228 times this month. This makes 23 007 boots a day on average.

We are sorry that Tails 5.8 affected many of you so badly.

Thanks to your patience and feedback, we were able to solve most of these new issues.

Changes and updates

• Update Tor Browser to 102.7.

• Update the Tor client to 0.4.7.13.

• Simplify the error screen of the Tor Connection assistant when connecting automatically.

• Improve the wording of the backup utility for the Persistent Storage.

• Remove the confirmation dialog when starting the Unsafe Browser.

Fixed problems

• Fix support for some graphics cards:

  • Update the Linux kernel to 6.0.12. This improves the support for newer hardware in general: graphics, Wi-Fi, and so on. (#18467)

  • Remove from the Troubleshooting Mode 2 boot options that break support for some graphics cards: nomodeset and vga=normal. (#19321)

  Please let us know if the support for your graphics cards has been fixed or is still broken.

• Fix starting AppImages that use the Qt toolkit like Feather and Bitcoin-Qt. (#19326)

• Fix clipboard encryption and decryption in Kleopatra. (#19329)

• Fix at least 2 cases of Persistent Storage not activating:

  • When activation takes longer (#19347)

  • When the Dotfiles feature includes symbolic links (#19346)

  Please keep reporting issues with the new Persistent Storage. We give them top priority!

• Fix 3 clipboard operations with KeePassXC:

  • Copying a passphrase to unlock a database (#19237)

  • Using the auto-type feature (#19339)

  • Clearing passwords automatically from the clipboard after 10 seconds

• Fix the display of the applications menu that was broken in some GTK3 applications installed as Additional Software. (#19371)

• Localize the homepage of Tor Browser when started from the Tor Connection assistant. (#19369)

For more details, read our changelog.

Known issues

Please keep reporting issues with the new Persistent Storage and when starting on graphics cards that used to work with Tails.

Tor Browser has no minimize and maximize buttons (#19328)

To work around this:

1. Right-click on the Tor Browser tab in the window list at the bottom of the screen.

2. Choose Minimize or Maximize.

Welcome Screen and Tor Connection don't fit on 800×600 (#19324)

The top of the Welcome Screen and some button of the Tor Connection assistant are cut out on small displays (800×600), like virtual machines.

You can press Alt+S to start Tails.

Progress bar of Tor Connection gets stuck around 50% (#19173)

When using a custom Tor obfs4 bridge, the progress bar of Tor Connection sometimes gets stuck halfway through and becomes extremely slow.

To fix this, you can either:

• Close and reopen Tor Connection to speed up the initial connection.

• Try a different obfs4 bridge.

  This issue only affects outdated obfs4 bridges and does not happen with obfs4 bridges that run version 0.0.12 or later.

See the list of long-standing issues.

Get Tails 5.9

To upgrade your Tails USB stick and keep your persistent storage

• Automatic upgrades are available from Tails 5.0 or later to 5.9.

  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:

• Install from Windows
• Install from macOS
• Install from Linux
• Install from Debian or Ubuntu using the command line and GnuPG

To download only

If you don't need installation or upgrade instructions, you can download Tails 5.9 directly:

• For USB sticks (USB image)
• For DVDs and virtual machines (ISO image)

What's coming up?

Tails 5.10 is scheduled for February 21.

Tails 5.8 is the most important release of Tails in years. It includes both major redesign of existing features, important usability improvements, and hardened security.

This work has been made possible by donations from users like you. If you like these changes and want more, donate now to fund our work in 2023.

Donate now to fund our work in 2023.

New features

New Persistent Storage

After 2 years of hard work, we are extremely proud to present you a complete redesign of the Persistent Storage.

The Persistent Storage hasn't changed much since its first release in 2012 because the code was hard to modify and improve. But, we learned from users that the Persistent Storage could do a lot more for you if it had more features and was easier to use.

• You don't have to restart anymore after creating the Persistent Storage or each time you activate a new feature.

• You can change the password of your Persistent Storage from this new application.

• You can choose to create a Persistent Storage directly from the Welcome Screen, if you don't have one already.

  

Wayland and better Unsafe Browser

We replaced the deprecated X.Org display system with Wayland.

Even if you won't notice any visual difference, Wayland brings more security in depth to Tails by making it harder for a compromised application in Tails to compromise or misuse another application.

For example, since Tails 4.8, the Unsafe Browser was disabled by default because a security vulnerability in another application in Tails could start an invisible Unsafe Browser, reveal your IP address, and deanonymize you.

Wayland fixes this vulnerability and makes it safe to reenable the Unsafe Browser by default. You can still disable the Unsafe Browser in the Welcome Screen.

Wayland also brings in other features that were not working yet in the Unsafe Browser:

• Sound - Uploads and downloads - Alternative input methods for Chinese and other non-Latin languages - Accessibility features like the screen reader and virtual keyboard

QR code scanning of Tor bridges

We made it easier to enter new Tor bridges in Tails by scanning a QR code.

To get a QR code, you can either:

• Send an empty email to bridges@torproject.org from a Gmail or Riseup email address.

• Get bridges from https://bridges.torproject.org/ and print the QR code on paper.

We are aware that the QR codes that are currently provided are too big to be easy to scan. We are working with Tor to make them smaller and easier to scan.

Changes and updates

• Update Tor Browser to 12.0.1.

• Update Thunderbird to 102.6.0.

• Update Tor to 0.4.7.12.

• Remove the Dasher graphical text entry application.

Fixed problems

We fixed 3 usability issues in the Tor Connection assistant:

• Display a percentage on the connection progress bar. (#19208)

  

• Fix links to documentation. (#19172)

• Add a Bridge label in front of the line to enter a custom bridge. (#19169)

For more details, read our changelog.

Known issues

If you are facing some of these issues, try downgrading to Tails 5.7. To do so:

• Download Tails 5.7
• Do a manual upgrade to Tails 5.7.

Problems with Qt applications like Kleopatra and Feather

Applications using the Qt toolkit have issues in Wayland. You can work around these issues by running these applications using XWayland instead.

Clipboard encryption and decryption is broken in Kleopatra (#19329)

To fix this:

1. Choose Applications ▸ Utilities ▸ Terminal to open a terminal.

2. Execute the following command in the terminal:

   unset QT_QPA_PLATFORM & kleopatra &
   

   This only works if Kleopatra has never been started since Tails started. Otherwise, execute this command and try again:

   killall kleopatra
   

AppImages like Feather wallet and Bitcoin-Qt fail to load (#19326)

To fix this:

1. Navigate to your AppImage in the Files browser.

2. Do right-click (on Mac, click with two fingers) in the folder and choose Open in Terminal.

3. Execute the following command in the terminal to start your AppImage.

   Replace:

   • application.AppImage by the file name of your AppImage.

   unset QT_QPA_PLATFORM ; ./application.AppImage

   For example, to start the Feather wallet version 2.1.2, execute:

   unset QT_QPA_PLATFORM ; ./feather-2.1.2.AppImage
   

Some graphics cards stopped working in Tails 5.8 (#19353)

People have reported us several graphics cards that used to work in Tails 5.7 and stopped working in Tails 5.8:

• Nvidia
  • 10de:0a70 GeForce 310M
  • 10de:1f82 GeForce GTX 1650: this is fixed in Tails 5.9
  • 10de:220a RTX 3080
  • 10de:2482 GA104 GeForce RTX 3070 Ti
  • 10de:2486 GA104 GeForce RTX 3060 Ti: this is fixed in Tails 5.9
  • 10de:2488 RTX 3070: this is fixed in Tails 5.9
  • 10de:2489 RTX 3060 Ti
  • 10de:24dc GA104M GeForce RTX 3080 Mobile
  • 10de:2504 RTX: this is fixed in Tails 5.9
  • 10de:2560 GA106M GeForce RTX 3060 Mobile
  • GeForce RTX 3060 Ti Founders Edition: this is fixed in Tails 5.9
  • 10de:25e0
• Intel
  • 8086:0046 Core Processor Integrated Graphic Controller
    • This will be fixed in Tails 5.9 with an update of the Linux kernel.
  • 8086:0a16 Haswell-ULT Integrated Graphics Controller
  • 8086:1916 Skylake GT2
    • Add the i915.force_probe=1916 boot option and let us know whether it helps.
  • 8086:3185 GeminiLake (UHD Graphics 600)
    • Add the i915.force_probe=3185 boot option and let us know whether it helps.
  • 8086:4690
    • Add the i915.force_probe=4690 boot option and let us know whether it helps.
  • 8086:4692 UHD Graphics 730
    • Add the i915.force_probe=4692 boot option and let us know whether it helps.
  • 8086:46a6 Alder Lake-P
    • Add the i915.force_probe=46a6 boot option and let us know whether it helps.
  • 8086:46a8
    • Add the i915.force_probe=46a8 boot option and let us know whether it helps.
  • 8086:4e55
    • To fix this, add the i915.force_probe=4e55 boot option.
  • 8086:4e71
    • Add the i915.force_probe=4e71 boot option and let us know whether it helps.
  • 8086:5917
    • Add the i915.force_probe=5917 boot option and let us know whether it helps.
  • 8086:8a56
    • To fix this, add the i915.force_probe=8a56 boot option.
• AMD
  • 1002:1506
  • 1002:15e7
  • 1002:6605 Radeon R7 M260X
  • 1002:6649 Bonaire FirePro W5100
  • 1002:73df RX Radeon 6700XT (Navi 22)
  • 1002:73ff Navi 23
  • 1002:743f RX 6400
• If the error message lists multiple graphics cards:
  • If possible, plug the monitor into the motherboard's Intel graphics card, as opposed to the external Nvidia or AMD/ATI graphics card.
  • Explicitly select one of the two graphics adapters in the BIOS instead of letting the system choose one automatically. If this does not solve the problem, try selecting the other graphics adapter.
  • Add the nouveau.modeset=0 boot option. This will force the system to use your other graphics cards, instead of the NVIDIA one.

These graphics card probably don't work as good on Wayland as they used to work on X.Org.

Unfortunately, we have no solution to offer you so far.

We hope that this gets fixed in the next update of the Linux kernel, maybe in Tails 5.9.

Persistent Storage fails to load with symbolic links in Dotfiles (#19346)

If you have symbolic links in the Dotfiles feature of your Persistent Storage, your Persistent Storage fails to load with the error message:

Failed to activate the Persistent Storage.
Please start Tails and send an error report.

To fix this, remove or replace these symbolic links.

The following instructions explain how to access the content of your Persistent Storage.

• When starting Tails:

  1. Do not unlock your Persistent Storage.

  2. Set an administration password.

• In Tails, unlock your Persistent Storage:

  1. Choose Applications ▸ Utilities ▸ Disks.

  2. In the Disks utility, select your Tails USB stick in the left pane.

  3. Select the TailsData LUKS partition in the right pane.

  4. Click the button.

  5. Enter the passphrase of your Persistent Storage.

  6. In the second password prompt, enter your administration password.

  7. Click the TailsData Ext4 that appeared below the TailsData LUKS partition.

  8. Click the .

  9. Close the Disks utility.

• Navigate to the content of your Persistent Storage:

  1. Choose Applications ▸ System Tools ▸ Root Terminal to open a terminal with administration rights.

  2. Execute the following command to open the Files browser with administration rights:

     nautilus
     

  3. In the Files browser, navigate to /media/amnesia/TailsData/dotfiles.

     Remove or replace all symbolic links in the dotfiles folder.

     Symbolic links have the following icon:

     

  4. Restart Tails and try unlocking your Persistent Storage like usually.

Tor Browser has no minimize and maximize buttons (#19328)

To work around this:

1. Right-click on the Tor Browser tab in the window list at the bottom of the screen.

2. Choose Minimize or Maximize.

Welcome Screen and Tor Connection don't fit on 800×600 (#19324)

The top of the Welcome Screen and some button of the Tor Connection assistant are cut out on small displays (800×600), like virtual machines.

You can press Alt+S to start Tails.

Switches of the Persistent Storage settings are very slow sometimes (#19291)

The switches that turn on and off the different features of the Persistent Storage are very slow to respond on some USB sticks. Please report on #19291 if this happens to you.

Progress bar of Tor Connection gets stuck around 50% (#19173)

When using a custom Tor obfs4 bridge, the progress bar of Tor Connection sometimes gets stuck halfway through and becomes extremely slow.

To fix this, you can either:

• Close and reopen Tor Connection to speed up the initial connection.

• Try a different obfs4 bridge.

  This issue only affects outdated obfs4 bridges and does not happen with obfs4 bridges that run version 0.0.12 or later.

See the list of long-standing issues.

Get Tails 5.8

To upgrade your Tails USB stick and keep your persistent storage

• Automatic upgrades are available from Tails 5.0 or later to 5.8.

  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:

• Install from Windows
• Install from macOS
• Install from Linux
• Install from Debian or Ubuntu using the command line and GnuPG

To download only

If you don't need installation or upgrade instructions, you can download Tails 5.8 directly:

• For USB sticks (USB image)
• For DVDs and virtual machines (ISO image)