Do the Qubes repos allow nonfree software? Does it allow for microcode or other software with binary blobs?

Yes. [image] Qubes Debian templates have non-free/contrib (apt) by default User Support Why is this nothing to worry about? Similar holds for Fedora. Plenty of non-free packages reported by vrms-rpm. And are these packages really needed for proper functioning of the VMs…

So if non-free software is a privacy and security risk; how can you call Qubes a privacy and security distro?

I don’t think anyone is calling Qubes a distro, or privacy focused, it’s a security focused OS. You are going to need microcode mitigation if you want security, and that type of firmware is close source. Qubes isn’t libre it’s shipped with closed source firmware, for the same reasons Debian recent…

Debian is not considered fully libre by the FSF. You’re saying this is because of closed cpu microcode firmware?

You can google the answer, but yes, close source firmware not just the microcode is a big part of the reason why.

So it’s not just CPU microcode

It’s tiring going over the same arguments over and over again, and I can only suppose at this stage that you are trolling. Here we are talking about microcode and firmware: Qubes includes both. If there were free packages available Qubes would include them by preference. Your argument is flawe…

[image] huaopeng: So if non-free software is a privacy and security risk That’s an assumption indeed! It’s better to use reliable non-free software rather than rely on security by obscurity like many little known Linux distros do. In fact, it has been said somewhere that Windows is much more…

[image] unman: There is no evidence that including non-free microcode is a privacy and security risk per se. [image] Why open source firmware is important for security Why open source firmware is important for security. Discussion on Hacker News . Als…

Nonfree Qubes Software

User Support

adw October 10, 2022, 5:44am 14

We discussed it here: