Is it really that bad to use windows as host OS for Whonix?
I have my burner laptop with Debian OS and Whonix that I use for most things tor related, but often times i travel abroad and I take only my main laptop that I use for regular things. How bad is if I use whonix in that laptop? In theory the Whonix VM is isolated by the Windows OS - but what are the risks really?
I know I can use Tails with my main laptop, but I wonder if whonix is also decent option even though my host os is windows?
Yes, it is that bad. If you can use Tails, you should. Windows has backdoors and they will give information from those backdoors to law enforcement. It is always better to be safe than sorry.
To elaborate think of windows as an insider snitching on you to the feds all the time on everything so yeah burn that shit down and never go back
It is very bad, you can dualboot a linux distribution on your main laptop
While it might be hypothetically possible to minimize many of the known risks on Windows if you're an expert in network security and know your way around the dozen or so different settings menus that exist in Windows 11 and between which the copious amounts of settings have been split amongst, most people aren't going to do that, the ones who have the knowledge to do so would likely prefer to use Linux anyways, and even if you did go through all that and choose to stay on Windows the fact that Windows is not an open source OS means that there's no way of telling for certain whether or not there's been anything else added that is not known about.
There may be a case for using Whonix on windows vs just straight up Windows, but I wouldn't recommend it for anything beyond shitposting on tforum or whatnot. If it's something you wouldn't be doing out in public and with nosy strangers looking over your shoulder, then you should probably not let Windows anywhere near it.
There may be a case for using Whonix on windows vs just straight up Windows, but I wouldn't recommend it for anything beyond shitposting on tforum or whatnot. If it's something you wouldn't be doing out in public and with nosy strangers looking over your shoulder, then you should probably not let Windows anywhere near it.