The benefits and drawbacks of an airgapped Qubes PC

General Discussion
27

if anyone read my threads, here and here ,
then you know that I’m being targeted, at the hardware level / root of trust.

But i don’t have any technical evidence, only common sense evidence,
since i’m not networking expert, not or cybersecurity expert, not or firmware expert.

this lead me to,
transforming my old laptop (intel pentium dual core), into an air-gapped laptop.

  1. installing old linux distro, that is not compatible with laptop wifi card. So since its installation, the laptop has never been connected to the internet (eliminate malware infection possibilities from internet). (i didn’t install Qubes, because old laptop specs cannot support).
  2. unplugging all NICs (wifi card, bluetooth module, adsl card)
  3. rarely plug in any usb storage device, maybe only 2-3 times, and the device also trust-able.
  4. using the air-gapped laptop in an empty room, without any other electronic devices. But still surrounded by many wifi signal, since nowadays wifi signal are everywhere, and also any other electromagnetic signal, such as radio, cellular, etc.

then i use the air-gapped laptop to type anything private.
but then, the leak still happen, and my adversary still know whatever I type in the air-gapped laptop.
so i really don’t know, how a laptop without NICs can still connect to the internet.

until then i read these several references: 1, 2, 3, 4

  • found out that without NICs, actually laptop component (memory, gpu, etc), still can emit radio signal, or weak wifi signal.
  • maybe then these signal can be captured by special software / hardware / tool ,
  • and what make it suspicious more is, several weeks ago, my ISP replaced my old modem and router, with a new bigger modem, and 2 big expensive router.

Now the questions are:

  • whether the firmware, by default, is commanding the air-gapped laptop component to emit signal ?
    if it is, then maybe flashing the firmware can solve the issue ?
  • but what if the laptop component, can naturally emit signal, without any command from firmware ?
    if it is, then maybe flashing the firmware cannot solve issue ?
  • any other possibilities ?