AuroraOS is a bootable-from-USB Linux distribution in the Tails tradition. Carry it in your pocket, boot it on any machine, and choose at startup whether to persist, vanish, route everything through Tor, or combine encrypted persistence with Tor routing.
Every power-on, the boot menu asks how private this session should be. Persistence and Tor are independent flags, so you can keep them separate or combine them when the job calls for it.
Files, settings, and apps are written to an encrypted (LUKS) partition on the USB and restored on the next boot. A genuine daily-use OS that travels with you.
The whole OS runs from RAM. The instant you shut down, every byte evaporates. Pull the stick and the host computer holds no trace you were ever there.
All traffic is forced through the Tor network in an amnesic session. A firewall kill-switch drops anything that can't be torified, and DNS resolves over Tor.
Unlock encrypted persistence and apply Tor routing in the same session. Your files survive reboot while network traffic goes through the kill-switch path.
Built on Debian stable with a modern GNOME desktop and a curated, privacy-first application set — modeled on Tails.
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This ISO is served through Cloudflare. That means Cloudflare — and any network between you and it — can see the IP address, time, and file of every download, exactly the way any website sees its visitors. This is unavoidable: you have to fetch a privacy OS over the open internet from some host before you can boot it. The same is true of Tails and every comparable project. AuroraOS protects you after you boot it — not while you download it.
To get it privately:
Note: the published SHA256 and signature prove the file wasn't
tampered with — they do nothing for privacy. Don't confuse the two.
Click Download ISO above to fetch the prebuilt AuroraOS image (~2.4 GB). Save it
somewhere you'll find it, then verify it against the published
SHA256 checksum before flashing.
Use Rufus (Windows) or balenaEtcher (any OS) to write the ISO onto a
USB stick of 8 GB or more. This erases the stick — back it up first.
Plug into any PC, enter the boot menu (F12 / F10 / Esc), and select AuroraOS. If the
custom boot menu appears, pick Amnesic, Persistent, Tor, or Persistent + Tor. Default user is
aurora (no password to log in), and auto-lock is disabled so it won't strand you.
Once, from any boot, run sudo aurora-persistent-setup. You'll choose a
passphrase you must remember (there's no recovery). On the next Persistent-mode
boot, type it at the prompt to unlock your files.
Prefer to build it yourself? AuroraOS is fully open source (MIT) and built with Debian's
live-build — the complete build configuration and build.sh live in the
source repository on GitHub ↗.
# Inside WSL2/Ubuntu, project root
./build.sh # full build
./build.sh clean # wipe & restart
./build.sh config # validate config onlyaurora-status # show current mode
sudo aurora-persistent-setup # create persistent volume
sudo aurora-set-password # enable screen locking
aurora-tor status # show Tor kill-switch state
aurora-upgrade # install signed updatesNo, and it doesn't claim to be. AuroraOS borrows Tails' ideas — amnesia and Tor routing — but is an independent, unaudited personal project. For genuine high-risk anonymity, use the real Tails.
AuroraOS is a live USB system by design — it runs from RAM and an optional encrypted partition on the stick itself. In Amnesic mode it doesn't write to the host's internal drives; like any OS it can see them if you choose to mount them.
No. It's configured in good faith (transparent proxy + firewall kill-switch + DNS-over-Tor) but has not been traffic-leak audited. Browser leaks, app telemetry, and fingerprinting can still de-anonymize you. Treat it as stronger than normal browsing, not magic.
Not as the normal live user. That is deliberate: if a desktop session is compromised, it should not be able to drop the kill-switch and leak your real IP. To leave Tor mode, reboot and choose Amnesic or Persistent.
Any amd64 (64-bit x86) PC that boots from USB. AuroraOS includes UEFI Secure Boot support, but firmware can still be awkward; if boot fails, test with Secure Boot disabled.
With Debian's live-build, the same toolchain behind Tails, Kali, and Parrot. The open-source repo ↗ holds the config; build.sh assembles a hybrid ISO.
Like Tails — not with apt, but by replacing the whole system image with a cryptographically signed one. The built-in AuroraOS Upgrader notifies you when a new version exists; one click verifies the signature and SHA-256, then atomically swaps the image on the USB (keeping the old one as a rollback). In Tor mode the download routes over Tor. An unsigned or tampered update is refused.
Yes. The ISO is served through Cloudflare, so it can see the IP address, time, and file of each download — the same way any website sees its visitors. There is no way around that: you have to fetch the OS over the open internet before you can boot it, and Tails and others are in exactly the same position. To avoid it, download over the Tor Browser or a VPN, or from a network not tied to you — then the host sees the Tor exit / VPN address instead of your real one. The published checksum and signature protect the file's integrity, not your privacy — and AuroraOS only makes you anonymous after you boot it, not while downloading.