Tails (The Amnesic Incognito Live System) is a Debian-based live operating system that runs from a USB stick. Boots into a fully-functional desktop environment where all internet traffic routes through Tor, no data is written to the host disk by default, and the entire session is wiped on shutdown. Free, open-source, maintained by The Tails Project (a French nonprofit since 2014).
What it means in practice
Tails is the answer to “I need to use a computer without leaving traces on it.” Insert the USB stick, boot from it, work, shut down, remove the stick. The host computer is unchanged; the session’s files, browser history, downloads, all gone with the shutdown unless explicitly saved to a separate persistent volume. The persistent volume itself is encrypted with a passphrase. Tor routing is enforced at the network level (every connection goes through Tor; software that does not respect this is blocked). Standard tooling for journalists working with sources, for activists in adversarial environments, for the SecureDrop platform on the editor side, for whistleblowers preparing leaks.
Who uses it, and against whom
Used by: journalists in newsrooms operating SecureDrop instances (the editor side runs on Tails), investigative reporters working on stories where the laptop must not retain artifacts, activists in countries where laptop forensics are routine, security researchers analyzing untrusted material, and (historically) Edward Snowden in the Snowden archive era. Adversaries: forensic examiners who get the laptop after the session has ended (no artifacts to find), local network observers (everything is Tor), and (in failure modes) malware on the host BIOS or firmware that can persist across Tails sessions (rare but documented; the Tails security model assumes the host hardware is uncompromised).
What you can change today
Download Tails from tails.boum.org (verify the GPG signature against the project key; the verification process is documented in detail because it matters). Write to a USB stick (8GB minimum, 16GB if you want a persistent volume). Boot from the USB on any reasonably-recent x86 computer (Tails does not run on Apple Silicon Macs as of 2026). For ongoing operational use: create a persistent volume on the same USB to retain Tor Browser bookmarks, GPG keys, KeePassXC vaults, and other state across sessions; the persistent volume is encrypted with a passphrase you set. Use Tails for the operations that require it; do not try to make it your daily-driver OS.