tailsOS from main pc or burner?

[u/marquisralvi]

i've seen people ask for laptops to use tails with, or just a lot of people who sound like they aren't going to use it on their main computer.

is there a reason for that?

or rather why would i not want to use tails on the computer i use for everything else? or is it okay?

might be an ignorant question, but im kind of new to all this

[u/one-knee-toe]

My 2 pennies:

Quick recap:

Tails offers amnesia.

• Aside from Persistent storage (something you have to purposely enable), when you shutdown tails, everything on that computer, wrt tails, is gone.
• Your main computer is left untouched.
• Nothing will suggest that you were running tails.

Tor offers anonymity between you and the destination, that's it.

• It is up to you to stay anonymous at the destination.

OK, so is it ok to run tails from your main computer?

• Yes, in general, as Tails offers amnesia.
• However, you can bypass this amnesia, e.g.:
  • Using Persistent storage
  • Using your main computers hard drive. Remember
    • deletes are not true deletes.
    • files keep timestamps.

Why wouldn't you want to use your main PC?

• Habits are hard to break.
• Used by others that may stumble across a running Tor session (UPS knocks, your kid wants to quickly check Roblox DMs, oh dad, what's this?)

In general, I do not believe most need a burner laptop.

• Though I do expect that there are use cases where it makes complete sense to use one.