Silk Road forums
Discussion => Security => Topic started by: Thurgood Jenkins on July 28, 2013, 09:25 pm
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Hey everyone,
So I just bought a new computer to run Tails full time so I don't have to restart my current one. I went with a pc cause I'm not going to actually have to use Windows 8-thank god- and they have cheap small ones. Just getting tails to boot on Windows 8 was a pain, but now I have tails up and running, but it doesn't recognize any networks. I ran tails on my mac to see if it was tails or just the computer, and it had no problems. I then tried to use the pc for internet without tails, didn't have an issue.
When I run tails, I run the standard Tails, not the "bridges" version or "truecrypt", just Tails on a persistent drive. When I click on the network icon, this is what shows up "No network devices available".
Please help.
Thanks,
Thurgood
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make sure you update your new PC computer that you bought , you might be needing some service packs or updates that make it function, also make sure your wifi is turned on.
look for a blue function key. and make sure u find the top f1 keys that have the small atenna with signal turned on
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The problem is that in tails there's no way to see if my wifi is on or not, that I know of. I've toggled it on/off with the Fn(function) key and the wireless button, but it doesn't seem to have an effect in tails.
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try reseting the tail usb drive, while restarting your computer together, usually i see this happen with all usb devices, also try updating the usb drive cuz it might need to install. and take off the automatic features on your new PC
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Hey everyone,
So I just bought a new computer to run Tails full time so I don't have to restart my current one. I went with a pc cause I'm not going to actually have to use Windows 8-thank god- and they have cheap small ones. Just getting tails to boot on Windows 8 was a pain, but now I have tails up and running, but it doesn't recognize any networks. I ran tails on my mac to see if it was tails or just the computer, and it had no problems. I then tried to use the pc for internet without tails, didn't have an issue.
When I run tails, I run the standard Tails, not the "bridges" version or "truecrypt", just Tails on a persistent drive. When I click on the network icon, this is what shows up "No network devices available".
Please help.
Thanks,
Thurgood
<Sigh>. The key phrase here is: "... I just bought a new computer to run Tails full time...."
More than likely, you're running into a hardware/driver issue. You have to understand that you simply cannot go out and buy any computer and have it automatically guaranteed to work with Linux -- this goes double for laptops. The reason for this is simple: the manufacturers have a vested interest in creating drivers for Windows. On the other hand, most of the Linux drivers that exist were created by volunteers. Wifi support has always been somewhat problematic when it comes to Linux.
I'm not saying that the situation is hopeless, but what I am saying is that if drivers are available, it may take some effort to get them working (assuming that it can be done in the first place.)
The first step is determining precisely what hardware is inside your laptop. For that, you can use a Windows software package called Speccy. You can download it from: http://www.piriform.com/speccy
Speccy should show the manufacturer, and chipset of your wireless hardware.
I'll also need to see the output of the following commands from Tails:
lspci
This command should show the hardware that Tails is able to see.
ifconfig (needs to be run as root)
This command will show you all the available network interfaces.
PM me with the results, and we'll take it from there.
Nightcrawler
4096R/BBF7433B 2012-09-22 Nightcrawler <Nightcrawler@SR>
PGP Key: http://pgp.mit.edu:11371/pks/lookup?op=get&search=0xB8F1D88EBBF7433B (MIT clearnet keyserver)
PGP Key: https://keys.indymedia.org/pks/lookup?op=get&search=0xB8F1D88EBBF7433B (IndyMedia https: clearnet keyserver)
PGP Key: http://qtt2yl5jocgrk7nu.onion/pks/lookup?op=get&search=0xB8F1D88EBBF7433B (IndyMedia .onion keyserver)
PGP Key: http://dkn255hz262ypmii.onion/index.php?topic=174.msg633090#msg633090 (Silk Road Forums PGP Key Link)
PGP Key Fingerprint = 83F8 CAF8 7B73 C3C7 8D07 B66B AFC8 CE71 D9AF D2F0
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Yeah, it can take a year for open source wifi drivers to be added to the Linux kernel. While it is possible to use Windows drivers with ndiswrapper, I've found that to be buggy a lot of the time. It's better to use native Linux drivers.
You have 2 options here.
1. Return that laptop and buy a used one off Craigslist or Ebay. If it's a few years old, it will be much more likely that the Linux kernel (version 3.2) included with Tails supports the wireless card. You should ask about the hardware details and figure out if it is supported, for example on these sites
http://wireless.kernel.org/en/users/Drivers
http://linux-wless.passys.nl
2. Buy a $10 usb wifi dongle that is supported on Linux. You can search the reviews on sites like Newegg for the key word "Linux" and see what people say about it. You would then plug in the dongle and run Tails.
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Nightcrawler, I don't think that will work, because adding the driver will probably require a reboot, and it will be lost. Tails is run from a static system image. Only stuff symlinked from $HOME to the persistent volume is stored across reboots.
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Nightcrawler, I don't think that will work, because adding the driver will probably require a reboot, and it will be lost. Tails is run from a static system image. Only stuff symlinked from $HOME to the persistent volume is stored across reboots.
You may be right... I can't remember offhand whether you need to reboot after doing an insmod, for example. He's probably better off doing what you suggest, returning the hardware or purchasing some usb dongle that is already supported.
Nightcrawler
4096R/BBF7433B 2012-09-22 Nightcrawler <Nightcrawler@SR>
PGP Key: http://pgp.mit.edu:11371/pks/lookup?op=get&search=0xB8F1D88EBBF7433B (MIT clearnet keyserver)
PGP Key: https://keys.indymedia.org/pks/lookup?op=get&search=0xB8F1D88EBBF7433B (IndyMedia https: clearnet keyserver)
PGP Key: http://qtt2yl5jocgrk7nu.onion/pks/lookup?op=get&search=0xB8F1D88EBBF7433B (IndyMedia .onion keyserver)
PGP Key: http://dkn255hz262ypmii.onion/index.php?topic=174.msg633090#msg633090 (Silk Road Forums PGP Key Link)
PGP Key Fingerprint = 83F8 CAF8 7B73 C3C7 8D07 B66B AFC8 CE71 D9AF D2F0
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2. Buy a $10 usb wifi dongle that is supported on Linux. You can search the reviews on sites like Newegg for the key word "Linux" and see what people say about it. You would then plug in the dongle and run Tails.
Astor offers sound advice as usual!
I'll also add: Tails is based on Debian which is the same Linux distro as the default image for the Raspberry Pi. Raspberry Pi computers are affordable, low power and do not have WiFi by default, so I'm willing to bet that the community over at raspberrypi.org have tested all the cheap USB WiFi dongles out there and know which ones work the best.
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Open a command prompt (aka the Terminal) and run the command 'iwconfig'
You want to boot with administrator [root] privileges already when you turn the PC/Laptop on.
Also consider running the command 'iwlist wlan0 scanning'
(If it says wlan0 is not an interface, the iwconfig command should list what the wireless interface is when you run that. If you don't see wlan0, then it may be wlan1 or even [rarely] eth0 or eth1. Ignore lo. And use wlan0 instead of eth0 if it's listed. That's your lan port that may show up even if not plugged in. If iwlist isn't a command...then I'll be damned.)
These are the manual commands used to control the wireless from 'under the hood' if you will. But they should work. If you want to learn more, do an internet search for the word 'man page' and the two commands. So search 'man page iwconfig' and/or 'man page iwlist'
It's a real pain in the ass to connect to a WPA2-secured wireless network using this method. You have to generally use something called wpa_supplicant. This is unless there is a GUI to do it for you such as a program called 'wicd' or 'kwifimanager' (only in KDE and requires KDE libs, so not in TAILS for certain.)
Some distros use wpa_supplicant as a Terminal command. If so, it will ask you what your wifi network name is, then what your passphrase is, then give you an encrypted key to place in a config file that is generally distro specific. Obviously something that's going to suck ass if you're using TAILS and restarting all the time.
I'm not sure that TAILS uses wicd because I've only used it a couple times when my main rig wasn't accessible. A quick startpage search didn't tell me much. I would really hope it does, however. (actually now that I think back, I definitely was using WPA2 encryption on my network..and there was a GUI to connect. So you probably just have to find it. But the first steps up there should eliminate that your wireless card is or is not being detected.)
In a nutshell you can run this:
iwlist wlan0 scanning
[lists all broadcasting nearby networks, pick one.]
iwconfig wlan0 essid YOUR_WIFI_NAME
[if it's an open wifi network then that's it! You're connected! Try to ping.]
wpa_supplicant [if applicable to run in tails, and if you have WPA, as you damn well should if it's your network.]
Sorry for being so detailed, yet so vague. Linux is my playground, but damn it there are so many different flavours and all of them are so needy in their own ways. This reminds me that I probably should learn a bit more about TAILS so I can use it if I need to.
Good luck OP and PM me if you need anything. I'll be on and off here for a while but I'll try to check at least once every couple days.