PC Operating systems 2.0

[dngray]

Closes: #1376

https://deploy-preview-1969--privacytools-io.netlify.app/operating-systems/#os

[dngray]

Maybe we should also do something about that microcode section. It looks messy and I think most distributions would do this by default.

[nitrohorse]

From my understanding, due to Whonix associating and using Gab as a platform, including it as a recommendation on PrivacyTools is counter to our code of conduct.

[dngray]

including it as a recommendation on PrivacyTools is counter to our code of conduct.

The code of conduct relates to our platforms, ie what we have control over.

Whonix was already listed previously, and has been since forever. We continue to mention it because purely because of technical merit. It has particular use cases that other distributions do not focus on. Eg. Virtualization, Physical Isolation etc.

My understanding is that the main leader of their team @adrelanos wants to keep things apolitical. That said I do agree some of their community weren't all that professional. Purporting to be a part of the organization before you are is not a good look. Somehow they still made it to being a part of the Whonix organization and were granted control over their social media presence.

I'm also not really interested in people virtue signaling as I don't think this adds to our mission. I don't like Gab or Facebook and I'd never use either, that said I don't think we should be basing our criteria on what social media sites others use.

[nitrohorse]

The code of conduct relates to our platforms, ie what we have control over.

Yeah, that's what I mean -- PrivacyTools has control over what is recommended and how it's recommended (as card or under "worth mentioning" for instance). You're right that Whonix has always been recommended on the site (not as a card though) but that doesn't mean it can't be re-evaluated.

Gab is a hateful platform--we all know this on the PrivacyTools team and actively moderate our services to protect the community from fascists. Yet the Whonix team continues to deliberately associate and use Gab. Thus from my perspective, by upgrading Whonix to a card (even currently being under "worth mentioning" is a problem) poses a greater problem: How are we able to uphold our CoC goals where "we strive to create a positive environment" and "we pledge to make our community a harassment-free experience for everyone" when software we give visibility and platform to as a recommendation actively chooses to undermine said goals for their community?

[dngray]

Gab is a hateful platform--we all know this on the PrivacyTools team and actively moderate our services to protect the community from fascists.

There would have to be people on that platform who are not fascists, just as there would be ones on Facebook that are. Neither are endorsed on PrivacyTools.

Yet the Whonix team continues to deliberately associate and use Gab

They also have a Facebook account too, which is a known violator of privacy. I think these are probably only used for outreach and online presence rather than any meaningful communication.

The endorsement for Whonix doesn't suggest users must use all their social media networks. Like we have some people who contact us via email, Matrix, or on our forums. That is up to the user.

It is also not the only way to contact the Whonix team/support, they have forums and other more direct methods of contact, Github etc.

I would not be keen to make this a precedent where all endorsed products must use what we endorse. We would have then turned this argument from one of merit into one of politics. I don't think that's helpful to our mission.

Thus from my perspective, by upgrading Whonix to a card (even currently being under "worth mentioning" is a problem) poses a greater problem: How are we able to uphold our CoC goals where "we strive to create a positive environment" and "we pledge to make our community a harassment-free experience for everyone" when software we give visibility and platform to as a recommendation actively chooses to undermine said goals for their community?

We've moved away from "worth mentioning" cards in general, throughout the site. Something is either good or it is not.

In the case of Whonix vs Tails, they have distinct different use cases, so one is not necessarily better than the other. A card vs "worth mentioning" leads readers to believe one product is a "better solution".

In regard to the CoC that only applies to our platforms, not everywhere else. We cannot be expected to enforce rules/our norms all-over the Internet. I do not also think anyone genuinely expects us to do so either.

[nitrohorse]

I would not be keen to make this a precedent where all endorsed products must use what we endorse. We would have then turned this argument from one of merit into one of politics. I don't think that's helpful to our mission.

I think it's important for us to draw a line here though with projects that choose to use Gab for outreach and communication. When a project is recommended on PrivacyTools, we recommend it holistically, not just by its technical merit and code (at least for me that's how I perceive things). When a project is recommended we direct PrivacyTools visitors to those sites and to those communities. Making Whonix (more) visible makes Gab (more) visible and further legitimizes it. My issue is that PrivacyTools would knowingly recommend and bring visibility to a project which knowingly uses Gab.

In regard to the CoC that only applies to our platforms, not everywhere else.

I see PrivacyTools.io as our main platform and thus our CoC covers what PrivacyTools chooses to endorse and recommend.

We cannot be expected to enforce rules/our norms all-over the Internet. I do not also think anyone genuinely expects us to do so either.

Of course, I agree. However, to me and my interpretation of our CoC and its coverage, recommending Whonix would create this problematic connection to some degree for our community: PrivacyTools -> Whonix -> Gab ... PrivacyTools -> Gab. Maybe my understanding of our CoC's enforcement is incorrect. But Gab is the point where I think PrivacyTools should be intolerant which extends to anything we recommend on our platforms if we're really trying to keep our community harrassment-free and inclusive.

[jonaharagon]

I feel perhaps as if this is outside the scope of this particular PR anyhow, which is cleanup, and deserves a separate issue (and therefore I have approved this PR). I would say this is a concern, but the Whonix team seems to have an interesting/misguided sense of what is political and what is not (see https://www.whonix.org/wiki/Official_Whonix_Online_Profiles#Selection_of_Platforms and https://www.whonix.org/wiki/Warning#Unsubstantiated_Conclusions)...

I think it's important for us to draw a line here though with projects that choose to use Gab for outreach and communication. When a project is recommended on PrivacyTools, we recommend it holistically, not just by its technical merit and code (at least for me that's how I perceive things).

I feel like this is a factor in whether or not to recommend Whonix, but it is one factor out of many. Whonix is also a long-standing project in the Tor community, a project that the Qubes project (another project well respected by security and privacy experts) trusts to use by default for Tor communication, and possibly the only way to browse Tor for users who are concerned about OS exploits de-anonymizing them (see: Facebook & TAILS exploit). These are all factors that also need to be considered, and FMPOV overall if anybody asked me what the most secure way to brose Tor was, I would still comfortably recommend the use of Whonix (+Qubes) every time.

[nitrohorse]

I feel perhaps as if this is outside the scope of this particular PR anyhow, which is cleanup, and deserves a separate issue (and therefore I have approved this PR).

To me this PR doesn't represent just cleanup: we're giving Whonix more visibility and legitimacy now as a card and thus inherently doing the same for Gab. What makes more sense to me is PR'ing Whonix to a card with a separate issue / PR.

I feel like this is a factor in whether or not to recommend Whonix, but it is one factor out of many.

Maybe I'm really off here, in the minority with the team, and misinterpreting our CoC. But to me--even taking into account a project's technical merit--not tolerating Gab nor a project's deliberate usage of Gab is consistent with our CoC and a precendent we need to set.

[dngray]

To me this PR doesn't represent just cleanup: we're giving Whonix more visibility and legitimacy now as a card and thus inherently doing the same for Gab.

Well it is in regard to grouping things together, ie "Tor focused distributions" and doing away with "Worth mentioning" lists. We've done a similar thing with the web browsing extensions page.

What makes more sense to me is PR'ing Whonix to a card with a separate issue / PR.

Not really, because that means we can't do away with "Worth mentioning" it also means that we would have a group with just Tails by itself, which would look silly. Tor focused distributions like Tails and Whonix have a very specific use case and that is enforcing Torification of all outgoing/incoming connections. This usecase would be unsuitable for someone who does not want to use Tor, or wants a general purpose operating system, hence the reason for splitting it off.

not tolerating Gab nor a project's deliberate usage of Gab is consistent with our CoC

Well they haven't displayed any overt behavior that is at odds with our CoC, they are only guilty of using a social network that we don't find desirable - albeit minimally along with a list of other undesirable social networks (they pretty much seem to have an official account for everything).

[nitrohorse]

that means we can't do away with "Worth mentioning" it also means that we would have a group with just Tails by itself, which would look silly.

To me, the formatting and layout of not upgrading Whonix to a card (or removing Whonix altogether) is a non-issue. Not tolerating Gab nor a project's deliberate usage of Gab for us to be consistent with our CoC is the stance that has the strongest merit in my mind.

Well they haven't displayed any overt behavior that is at odds with our CoC, they are only guilty of using a social network that we don't find desirable.

Gab isn't just a social network I find undesirable. It's specifically a fascist cesspit (fundamentally breaking our CoC) that Whonix has chosen to use to direct their users to and to welcome Gab users into the Whonix community (besides the actual content of their Gab messages). And they've deliberately ignored questioning to the point of losing potential funding.

[danarel]

I don't expect it to make a difference, but I wanted to chime in and say I am opposed to including Whonix as well.

[jonaharagon]

♥️

[freddy-m]

Would Parabola not be a better alternative to Arch, seeing as it was mentioned in the old page as a fully open source alternative?

[dngray]

Would Parabola not be a better alternative to Arch, seeing as it was mentioned in the old page as a fully open source alternative?

The reason it was removed was because of maintenance issues iirc.

[dngray]

I think we might swap out Guix for NixOS. We really can't be recommending kernels that have known vulnerabilities for political reasons.

But what is surprising is the "the introduction of binary blobs as arrays of numbers in source code for gen7 i915 gpus." That is actually the Intel Haswell / Ivybridge iGPU Leak mitigation that was worked around for addressing CVE-2019-14615, a.k.a. the Intel iGPU information leakage vulnerability from a few months ago that was corrected promptly for modern Intel Gen graphics but the Gen7/Gen7.5 mitigation took much longer due to working around huge performance penalties initially that occurred.

Those performance issues were resolved and the Intel Ivybridge/Haswell iGPU Leak mitigation was merged in Linux 5.7 to prevent those users on these older generation graphics from potentially being compromised. But GNU Linux-libre 5.7 is unprotected now over the handling of it.

Hopefully the next GNU Linux-libre kernel will end up changing their stance on that, but for now it actually puts their kernel at risk to this Intel iGPU Leak vulnerability. At least from the side of the university researchers that discovered this Intel graphics vulnerability, iGPU Leak can be used for website fingerprinting, AES attacks, and other exposure. Proof of concept code is available and more details via the iGPU-Leak research.

As a result we're also going to be removing the contrib label, as all distributions now are based off a mainline kernel.

CPU mitigations section will also be removed because it is expected that we only recommend distributions which are secure-by-default. If a user has disabled this then they know what they are doing.

[jonaharagon]

Thanks @dngray

[freddy-m]

@dngray I just remembered about Hyperbola, another open source, Arch alternative. It seems to be getting updates, though from the site it says that they are "planning on implementing a completely new OS derived from several BSD implementations". Nonetheless, though that it was worth mentioning.

[dngray]

Nonetheless, though that it was worth mentioning.

Thanks, I'll keep an eye on it. At this time it is too young to be added.