Tails

#2 Updated by intrigeri 2020-04-19 15:40:10

Hi,

> Multiple users have been reporting that Etcher claims that the copied Tails image doesn’t match the image file.

Interesting!
As I understand it, Etcher’s job is to blindly copy bits as-is from the image file to the USB stick, so I have a hard time figuring out how our image file could trigger this behavior. This smells like a buggy USB stick.
Just curious: did you get any such report with Tails << 4.5~rc1 ?
I can’t think of anything else at the moment.

I’ll leave reproducing attempts to others, who have access to Windows/macOS, such as sajolida.

#3 Updated by BlueberryMuffin 2020-04-20 19:25:42

intrigeri wrote:
As I understand it, Etcher’s job is to blindly copy bits as-is from the image file to the USB stick, so I have a hard time figuring out how our image file could trigger this behavior. This smells like a buggy USB stick.
Just curious: did you get any such report with Tails << 4.5~rc1 ?
I can’t think of anything else at the moment.

#4 Updated by BlueberryMuffin 2020-04-20 19:51:57

BlueberryMuffin wrote:
> intrigeri wrote:
> As I understand it, Etcher’s job is to blindly copy bits as-is from the image file to the USB stick, so I have a hard time figuring out how our image file could trigger this behavior. This smells like a buggy USB stick.
> Just curious: did you get any such report with Tails << 4.5~rc1 ?
> I can’t think of anything else at the moment.

I am one of those who reported this bug. And no, it’s definitely not a problem with the usb-sticks, and it’s definitely not a problem with the computers. It’s simply a problem with Etcher/Windows/Linux (Tails).

I’ve tried 3 completely new, 16GB usb-sticks, from 2 different brands. I’ve also tried downloading and installing Tails multiple times on 2 different Windows 10 computers, from 2 different brands. I’ve also tried downloading Etcher directly from their own website, where I tried both the portable version and the standard version of Etcher (for Windows). I’ve also tried formatting the usb-sticks as both fat32 and NTFS before installing Tails onto them, to check if the different types of format would make any difference. But none of these things made any difference. The end-result is still the same every time. (“1 failed device” —> checksum verification mismatch.)

So as you can see, I’ve tried changing every possible variable in an attempt to discover what the problem is, but nothing has helped. And this problem was equally present with the previous version of Tails, before 4.5 .

However, I did read something online about how “Windows is unable to read Linux-software”, so that might be what’s causing it… I’m not a computer-technician, so I have no idea, but maybe Windows simply can’t read Tails after it’s been installed onto the usb-stick - because Tails is Linux. So maybe that’s why the verification of the checksum always fails after the successful installation. It would kind of make sense, because Tails itself seems to work perfectly when I try it out (after having installed it onto the usb-stick by using Etcher). It’s only the verification that fails; Tails itself seems to run just fine.

#5 Updated by BlueberryMuffin 2020-04-20 20:02:02

Just to add: I’ve tried downloading the Tails-image multiple times as well, and I verified the image successfully via the browser-extension every time. So the problem is not a corrupt Tails-image.

#8 Updated by BlueberryMuffin 2020-04-21 18:30:48

Thanks for the help. But I’d rather not fool around with the “System Volume Information” and things like that, as I’m not a computer guy, so I don’t want to risk ruining something on my computer.

By the way, can I install the ISO-image on a usb-stick, or does it have to be installed on a DVD? And are there any risks involved with using the ISO-version of Tails, regarding my online-anonymity, as opposed to using the IMG-version of Tails?

And if I were to use the successfully installed IMG-version of Tails instead (which failed the verification), could that somehow be dangerous to my online-anonymity? Because Tails itself seems to run just fine, in spite of the fact that it failed the verification.

#9 Updated by sajolida 2020-04-22 21:21:25

> But I’d rather not fool around with the “System Volume Information” and things like that, as I’m not a computer guy, so I don’t want to risk ruining something on my computer.

@BlueberryMuffin: Understood!

So skip trying out this tutorial from superuser.com and don’t mess with
your Windows :)

As instructed in my previous note, we would still be very interested if
you could:

• Test installing an ISO image.
• Try to see if the USB stick that fails the verification has a “System
  Volume Information” in its system partition.

To do so:

1. Reinstall a fresh USB stick with an Etcher that fails verification.
2. Start from this USB stick. I understand from your last note that you
can still start from it.
3. Open the Files browser.
4. Click on “Other Locations” and “Computer” and navigate to the folder
/lib/live/mount/medium.
5. Tell us if you see anything else than: EFI, live, syslinux and utils.

> By the way, can I install the ISO-image on a usb-stick, or does it have to be installed on a DVD?

You should be able to install the ISO image on a USB stick and start
from it. At least it was possible some years ago. UEFI and Secure Boot
might not work, though.

> And are there any risks involved with using the ISO-version of Tails, regarding my online-anonymity, as opposed to using the IMG-version of Tails?

If it works, the only downside is that you won’t be able to have
automatic upgrades and a Persistent Storage. Other than that the
security properties are the same.

If you manage to start from the ISO image, you can also then installed a
second USB stick by cloning it from Tails Installer. This second USB
stick can have automatic upgrades and a Persistent Storage.

See https://tails.boum.org/install/clone

What I’m really interested in testing here is whether Etcher will behave
differently when installing an ISO image instead of an USB image. If it
works for you to install an ISO image, then it would confirm that we are
facing the same problem as these people in the forum.

Once we confirm this hypothesis, we will be able to work on solving this
problem for everybody else who faces this issue.

> And if I were to use the successfully installed IMG-version of Tails instead (which failed the verification), could that somehow be dangerous to my online-anonymity?

If we are facing the same problem as these people in the forum, I would
say that it’s safe to use it anyway.

> Because Tails itself seems to run just fine, in spite of the fact that it failed the verification.

Right.

#10 Updated by BlueberryMuffin 2020-04-23 13:30:34

I’ve started up an IMG-version of Tails which had failed the Etcher-verification. I then located the folder /lib/live/mount/medium.
Within this folder (medium), I can see the following folders appear: EFI, live, syslinux, System Volume Information, utils.

As for the ISO-version of Tails, Etcher installed it flawlessly onto a brand new USB-stick. (With this ISO-version of Tails, Etcher says “Flash Complete! 1 successful device”. But with the IMG-version of Tails, Etcher would always say “Flash Complete! 1 failed device”.)