en	[[!meta title="What we achieved together in 2022"]]

en	**If a tool is hard to use, it is less secure.**

en	When digital security tools are too complicated to use, people make mistakes that compromise their security or simply give up and fall back on more dangerous practices.

en	Because journalists and whistleblowers use Tails to expose abuse of power and activists use Tails to defend human rights and our planet, the more people use Tails, the better we are all protected.

en	In 2022, we focused on making it easier to install Tails and improving many existing features, instead of adding new features. Here are some highlights.

en	Our work is only possible thanks to the donations of our many supporters. In 2020&ndash;2022, [[donations from passionate people like you|donate]] represented 76% of our income. This is the best proof of the value of our work and our biggest motivation.

en	Thanks!

en	[[!toc levels=2]]

en	Better tools

en	*Persistent Storage*

en	The biggest change is still to come as we will release a complete redesign of the Persistent Storage in Tails 5.8 (December 20). You can already test the new Persistent Storage in [[Tails 5.8~beta1|test_5.8-beta1]].

en	The Persistent Storage hadn't changed much since its first release in 2012 because the code was hard to modify and improve. But, we learned from users that the Persistent Storage could do a lot more for you if it had more features and was easier to use.

en	The new Persistent Storage won't require restarting after creating it or each time you activate a new feature.

en	It will also make it easier for us to persist more settings in the future.

en	And finally, it looks so much better!

en	[[!img test_5.8-beta1/create.png link="no" alt=""]]

en	[[!img test_5.8-beta1/features.png link="no" alt=""]]

en	PGP tools

en	We know that lots of our users depend on PGP tools to protect their communications. But, we also know that PGP tools are notoriously hard to use.

en	We made 2 big changes to PGP tools in Tails:

en	We added [[*Kleopatra*|doc/encryption_and_privacy/kleopatra]], a swiss army knife for all things PGP.

en	*Kleopatra* replaced the *OpenPGP Applet* and the *Password and Keys* utility, also known as *Seahorse*, which were not actively developed anymore and had many issues.

en	[[!img version_5.0/kleopatra.png alt="" link="no"]]

en	We updated *Thunderbird* to 102, which includes major usability improvements to the OpenPGP feature.

en	When composing an email, you can now see whether it will be encrypted or not. If encryption is impossible, a key assistant helps you solve key issues.

en	[[!img version_5.5/thunderbird_102.png link="no" alt="Thunderbird composer window with encryption turned on and notification about a missing key and how to resolve the issue."]]

en	*Tor Connection* assistant

en	We conducted usability tests of the *Tor Connection* assistant in France and Brazil with people who were new to Tails to identify issues in complicated cases: when connecting to Tor is blocked by censorship or a captive portal.

en	We fixed [28 usability issues](https://gitlab.tails.boum.org/tails/tails/-/issues/?sort=closed_desc&state=closed&label_name%5B%5D=C%3ATor%20Connection&first_page_size=20) identified during these tests. For example:

en	The *Tor Connection* assistant now automatically fixes the computer clock if you choose to connect to Tor automatically. This makes it much easier for people in Asia to circumvent censorship.

en	We made it easier to open the *Unsafe Browser* to sign in to a network. This makes it much easier to use Tails on public networks in airports, libraries, and so on.

en	In Tails 5.8 (December 20), you will be able to scan a QR code from your phone to enter a Tor bridge:

en	[[!img test_5.8-beta1/qr_code.png link="no" alt=""]]

en	*Unsafe Browser* and Wayland

en	Tails 5.8 will also make the *Unsafe Browser* both safer and easier to use by migrating it to the Wayland display technology.

en	Wayland brings more security in-depth to Tails by making it harder for a compromised application in Tails to compromise or misuse another application.

en	Wayland also fixes other features that were not working yet in the *Unsafe Browser*:

en	Sound

en	Uploads and downloads

en	Alternative input methods for Chinese and other non-Latin languages

en	Accessibility features like the screen reader and virtual keyboard

en	Metadata cleaning

en	We added *Metadata Cleaner*, a new tool to clean metadata from your files.

en	[[!img version_5.7/metadata_cleaner.png link="no" alt=""]]

en	When we switched to *MAT* 0.8.0 in Tails 4.0, *MAT* lost its graphical interface and was only accessible from the contextual menu of the *Files* browser. It became especially hard for new users to learn how to clean their files. *Metadata Cleaner* fixes this by providing a simple and easily discoverable graphic interface to remove metadata.

en	*Metadata Cleaner* works on the same file formats and is as secure as *MAT* because *Metadata Cleaner* also uses *MAT* in the background to do the actual cleaning.

en	Backups

en	We added a utility to make a backup of the Persistent Storage to another Tails USB stick.

en	[[!img version_4.25/backup.png link="no" alt=""]]

en	It's pretty basic. We still want to do something better in [[!tails_ticket 7049]], but we didn't want to wait more because we know that backups are a big issue for our users.

en	Easier installation

en	Installation instructions

en	During usability tests in Mexico and Brazil, we realized that our installation process was already pretty easy to follow, but that some people were getting lost while navigating between the different pages.

en	We simplified our instructions by making them into a [[single page|install/windows]].

en	We added animations and more exciting visuals.

en	<video autoplay loop muted width="200" height="200" poster="https://tails.net/install/inc/success/install.png"> <source src="https://tails.net/install/inc/success/install.mp4" type="video/mp4" /> </video>

en	Finally, we fixed no less than [30 other smaller usability issues](https://gitlab.tails.boum.org/tails/tails/-/issues/?sort=closed_desc&state=closed&label_name%5B%5D=C%3AInstallation&first_page_size=20) in the instructions!

en	Tails.net and more reliable downloads

en	After 13 years of relying on the domain name of our historical hosting provider, *boum.org*, we finally acquired a simple, beautiful, and trustworthy domain name of our own:

en	🎉 ✨ ***tails.net*** ✨ 🎉

en	It will take us some time to migrate all our services to this new name.

en	As a start, we deployed <https://download.tails.net/>. This new service uses [Mirrorbits](https://github.com/etix/mirrorbits), a more reliable way of redirecting downloads to one of our mirrors. It prevents many broken downloads and automates some tedious work.

en	Team life

en	New team members

en	Our team grew and welcomed 2 new full-time workers:

en	[@disoj](https://gitlab.tails.boum.org/disoj) joined us as our Project Manager in April.

en	She will help our team grow, mature, and ultimately serve our users better. It's the first time that we hired for a managerial position, so it's a very big and positive change.

en	[@groente](https://gitlab.tails.boum.org/groente), a long-term Sysadmin consultant, joined us full-time in July.

en	He will help us deploy better infrastructure to make our work more efficient while keeping all our machines (and thus your Tails) secure.

en	Organizational redesign

en	Behind the curtains, Tails operates as a small team that values transparency, autonomy, and horizontal decision-making. We have always worked fully remotely and now have team members in 10 different countries.

en	All this can be challenging sometimes :)

en	This year, we redesigned, clarified, and documented our internal organizing a lot. In particular, it is now clearer who is responsible, and legitimate, to make which decisions. This will make Tails a more pleasant and efficient working place, so we can focus more of our energy on improving our tools.

en	We never let you down!

en	To always keep you safe, a significant part of our work consists in releasing Tails every 4 weeks, updating to new version of *Tor Browser* and the *Tor* client, migrating to new technologies in GNOME or Debian, etc.

en	We released:

en	14 releases, never skipping a single update of *Tor Browser*.

en	Tails 5.0 based on Debian Bullseye, with important technical migrations.

en	2 emergency releases to fix critical vulnerabilities in the *Tor* client and the *Linux* kernel.

en	All this work has been made possible by donations from users like you. If you like these changes and want more, donate now to fund our work in 2023.

en	[[Donate]]