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QubesOS – A reasonably secure operating system

qubes-os.org

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Re: QubesOS – A reasonably secure operating system

#111

Post by adgjlsfhk1 »

davidandgoliath wrote: post #76
Syonyk wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The problem is that containers rely on the OS kernel to enforce separation, and kernel exploits are an awful lot less rare than anyone would prefer. If someone is delivering targeted malware to a company through HR channels, it's safe to assume that if they can escape the document viewer, they can probably also try for a local root/kernel exploit and escape the container. Containers are separation of convenience - no…

And container escape exploits are getting burned by sending them out via email? Doubtful.

well if you bother to send an email that breaks out of the container, you might as well make it retrospectively delete the email to hide the evidence :)

Re: QubesOS – A reasonably secure operating system

#112

Post by archo »

dang wrote: post #81

Related. Others? Qubes OS 4.2-rc1 is available for testing - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36178205 - June 2023 (3 comments) New user guide: How to organize your qubes - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33396604 - Oct 2022 (15 comments) What Is Qubes OS? - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32036899 - July 2022 (82 comments) Qubes OS: A reasonably secure operating system - https://news.ycombinator.com/it…

Stellar Work - Thanks Dan.

Re: QubesOS – A reasonably secure operating system

#113

Post by moondev »

legrande wrote: post #22
flashback2199 wrote: post #7

I really like QubesOS, but you cannot run VMs inside a qube, or other things that require VMs like Docker Desktop for Linux, because the xen hypervisor does not support nested virtualization.

> nested virtualization Such abstraction is very unstable. You can always VNC into a machine from a browser though, so 'vmception' can be achieved.

As someone who often runs multiple entire virtualized datacenters on top of ESXi hosts which are actually virtual machines themselves running in ESXi, I highly disagree.

Nested virtualization is a game changer in any kind of lab scenario. It also runs great on Chromebooks. The ChromeOS Linux environment is actually a KVM, so launching virtual machines from there is nested but you would never know it (based on my experience with the (framework Chromebook edition). Having 64GB of memory doesn't hurt either of course.

Re: QubesOS – A reasonably secure operating system

#114

Post by no_time »

neodypsis wrote: post #23
weinzierl wrote: post #5

I used it when I worked as a hiring manager. For this task it is ideal. All the behavioral security measures, like only to open attachments from people you trust, break down when your job description is basically to figure out who you can trust. Qubes comes with a "Convert to trusted PDF" out of the box. Joanna Rutkowska explained how it works under the hood pretty nicely[1]. The tldr is that it is very thorough. Wit…

You can use something similar on macOS, Windows or Linux, based on Docker containers, see Dangerzone: https://github.com/freedomofpress/dangerzone

Is this really a good idea? Won't the pdf thumbnail generator pwn you by merely navigating into the folder that contains the infected file?

Re: QubesOS – A reasonably secure operating system

#115

Post by ThePowerOfFuet »

flashback2199 wrote: post #73
haswell wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not a Qubes user, just a curious reader; what is the issue with this? It sounds like you’re implying that what parent said isn’t practical. I’m curious why?

The issue with trying to hack Docker Desktop and similar tools to boot a qube instead of a VM and somehow hack QubesOS to not isolate those qubes from each other seems self-evident to me and I don't care to explain further.

Technically correct, but kind of a shitty answer, no?

Re: QubesOS – A reasonably secure operating system

#116

Post by fsflover »

snvzz wrote: post #92
Syonyk wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> What kind of threat model requires someone to use Qubes? "Not trusting modern software to be correct nor secure" is sufficient. I do almost all my web browsing in disposable VMs with no access to interesting things like my password manager, email, SSH keys, etc. I also run JITless (disable Javascript JIT engine), because those are a common attack point on browsers. If you compromise my browser from a random site, y…

>You still have to get through Xen to get to anything I consider of value. It's not unthinkable, as Xen is huge, at hundreds of kLoCs. But there's an effort[0] to make a Qubes that uses seL4 in place of Xen. 0. https://trustworthy.systems/projects/TS/makatea

Most of Xen's vulnerabilities do not affect Qubes OS: https://www.qubes-os.org/security/xsa/.

Re: QubesOS – A reasonably secure operating system

#117

Post by fsflover »

syntaxing wrote: post #52

Whoa is this firefox containers but at an OS level. Can you SSH to each container without using the window environment? I wanted to use something like proxmox but decided not to because my computer was only 4 cores and 4 threads. If I can use this but "dynamically" allocate the CPUs, it would be perfect for my application.

You can't ssh into the Qubes VMs from dom0. It would break the security model. You do not run anything in dom0 at all. But you can create an AdminVM that manages other VMs.

Re: QubesOS – A reasonably secure operating system

#118

Post by JackRumford »

ghgr wrote: post #37

I highly recommend it. Since I tried it a couple of years ago I can't imagine working without it. Examples of things that I can't imagine doing in any other system: - curl|bash or similar - pip install, npm install etc - run any random github project - sudo install the drivers of my Brother printer - install zoom - plug random cheap USB devices to eg update their firmware In addition to that you can easily restart fr…

Ashamed to say but I do all these things on my main OSs for ~15 years and I never had any problem (IIRC). Yes, I'm not huge on security and I realize what this could do, but I figure the chance is as big as getting it through a channel I don't expect.

Re: QubesOS – A reasonably secure operating system

#119

Post by [deleted] »

JackRumford wrote: post #118
ghgr wrote: post #37

I highly recommend it. Since I tried it a couple of years ago I can't imagine working without it. Examples of things that I can't imagine doing in any other system: - curl|bash or similar - pip install, npm install etc - run any random github project - sudo install the drivers of my Brother printer - install zoom - plug random cheap USB devices to eg update their firmware In addition to that you can easily restart fr…

Ashamed to say but I do all these things on my main OSs for ~15 years and I never had any problem (IIRC). Yes, I'm not huge on security and I realize what this could do, but I figure the chance is as big as getting it through a channel I don't expect.

[deleted]

Re: QubesOS – A reasonably secure operating system

#120

Post by ThePowerOfFuet »

Dah00n wrote: post #75

Neither of my AM5 motherboards will allow QubesOS to install with Secure Boot on (and it's not going to be turned off) which really annoys me as I want to use it.

The installer is likely not signed in a way Secure Boot trusts it. Verify the ISO yourself with the PGP key, disable Secure Boot, install it, re-enable Secure Boot.
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