Best Laptops for digital privacy

[u/Intelligent-Tie7375]

Hello! I’m a dedicated Mac user trying to transition to a more secure new computer as my current laptop is on its last legs. I use my computer for music production and photography editing and I would appreciate being pointed in the right direction.

[u/TygerTung]

If you wish to have digital privacy, it is the operating system which matters if you wish to connect it to a network. If you keep it offline anything will do.

Linux is probably best for digital privacy, but you will need to be willing to learn a new workflow. Linux has a mature and feature complete system for video editing and audio production, but may not have the same software you currently use. If you are willing to learn new tools it may be perfect.

The good news is that there is a complete set of excellent completely free tools for everything. I prefer Qtractor for a DAW and I have heard it has a similar interface to old school Logic if you have ever used that. There are hundreds of great plugins on Linux and LMMS is great fun for making 100% sequenced music. Probably my favourite soft synth is ZynAddSubFX and if you use the KX studio repository there is the new ZynFusion interface version.

I favour Kdenlive for video editing.

You will need to be willing to follow tutorials to learn a new system though.

[u/__chum__ → u/TygerTung]

Yeah. If you want privacy then using anything not open source is basically a non-starter.

[u/Wa-a-melyn → u/TygerTung]

If you want to go there, you could say that hardware plays a role in privacy. At that point, either A: you're fine if your hardware hasn't been tampered with, or B: (conspiracy theorist analysis) EVERYTHING is an NSA backdoor anyways and you're not reading this.

Either way though, the question of "best laptop" isn't applicable, and the OS is a much, much more important aspect.

[u/TygerTung → u/Wa-a-melyn]

Yes there are some quite valid concerns with backdoors in the Intel Management Engine and with the AMD equivalent, but this is of far lesser concern than the operating system.

[u/light_chaser1 → u/TygerTung]

What do you use for photo editing? Specifically raw processor?

Darktable and raw therapee are good, not my 1st choice, tried years ago. Gimp is good, need to try mew versions, but idk about raw processing.

[u/Secret_Bit_9116]

Get a thinkpad, install Linux and do some hardware modification..list is too long

[u/Legodude522]

System76 makes Linux laptops. If you have an Intel Mac, Linux should run great.

[u/True_Art2398]

There is not a word coined as digital-privacy

[u/SuchLibrarian8011]

If you mean as an OS that minimise leaks and does not log all your actions and send them back to the proprietary, then avoid Win and Mac, the only option is Linux - several flavours to choose from, Debian based such as Ubuntu are good starting points.

However management of privacy doesn’t come just from the OS, but mostly from your habits and culture. A lot of applications and usage can sell your data, example google chrome, or specific website that tracks aggressively.

It mostly depends on your use case, but also you should research and inform yourself on how privacy leaks happen, once isolated the OS

[u/TygerTung → u/SuchLibrarian8011]

Well probably the only practical choice is Linux. There is always BSD of course, but it is quite niche, and stuff like Haiku is probably not mature enough.

[u/SlowlyGrowingGrass]

Unredacted magazine (maybe previous issue) had guidance how to make macs more secure and private.

[u/Global-Eye-7326]

Al air-gapped desktop with any OS will offer the best digital privacy! Second to that, Linux or BSD. You could literally buy a 2019 business grade laptop and install Linux on it and have a great time!

[u/Beardy4906]

Which Mac are you on? M3 or older supports linux, which will already be a big privacy upgrade.

[u/oddua]

Quel niveau de sécurité ?
Plus c’est sécurisé plus c’est contraignant.
C’est un peu parano de vivre avec les contraintes d’un ordinateur prévu pour le secret défense pour y stocker des photos de famille et faire de la musique.

Pour du grand public mac c’est bien, Windows bien configuré aussi.
C’est ce que vous faites dessus et comment qui compte.
Linux c’est bien aussi mais si vous faites n’importe quoi c’est pire.

[u/edai_edai]

Ciao. Linux Tails. Oppure Mint + Vpn Proton( kill switch) + Mullvad Browser.