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[[!meta title="Protecting your identity when using Tails"]]
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Protecting your identity when using Tails
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[[!inline pages="doc/about/warning/identity.inline" raw="yes" sort="age"]] [[!toc levels=2]]
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Clean metadata from files before sharing them
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Many files contain hidden data, or metadata:
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JPEG and other image files often contain information about where a picture was taken and which camera was used.
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Office documents often contain information about their author, and the date and time the document was created.
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To help you clean metadata, Tails include [[<i>Metadata Cleaner</i>|doc/sensitive_documents/metadata]], a tool to remove metadata in a wide range of file formats.
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Metadata has been used in the past to locate people from pictures they took. For an example, see <a href="https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2012/12/04/166487197/betrayed-by-metadata-john-mcafee-admits-hes-really-in-guatemala">NPR: Betrayed by metadata, John McAfee admits he's really in Guatemala</a>.
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Use Tails sessions for only one purpose at a time
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If you use Tails sessions for more than one purpose at a time, an adversary could link your different activities together.
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For example, if you log into different accounts on the same website in a single Tails session, the website could determine that the accounts are used by the same person. This is because websites can tell when 2 accounts are using the same Tor circuit.
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To prevent an adversary from linking your activities together while using Tails, restart Tails between different activities. For example, restart Tails between checking your work email and your whistleblowing email.
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We are not aware of any such attacks to deanonymize people online who used Tails for different purposes at a time.
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If you worry that the files in your [[Persistent Storage|doc/persistent_storage]] could be used to link your activities together, consider using a different Tails USB stick for each activity. For example, use one Tails USB stick for your activism work and another one for your journalism work.
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