New user looking for first secure laptop

I am considering buying one of the Purism Laptops but have a few questions. I am by no means and advanced user but I am above average and I am always able to figure new things out. I have built most of my own PCs but nothing cutting edge.

My main concern is privacy. I would like to do most of my Crypto trading on it. And I would also host a few commonly used walletss perhaps unless I hear good reasons not to. I would probably not use this laptop for general website surfing as I have others unless people think I’m being too paranoid.

I have a hardware wallet for my main coins and a FIDO U2F device for my email accounts and use 2fa whenever possible. I’m sure I’m not perfect but I’m happy so far.

I’m not a code expert so would I not benefit from an open source software? I noticed some clearance models without the TPM and was wondering since I’m not a code expert would buying the clearance make sense?

Any help at all would be appreciated. Never bought anything like this. But they seem great from what I understand.

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hello and welcome. i’m new too and just bought my first librem 15 v3 fifth batch. it hasn’t arrived yet but it’s on it’s way. about a few days processing before it was shipped by the manufacturer. so nothing concrete yet.

anyway…

All devices beeing manufactured by Purism run PureOS. this happy marriage of software and hardware is not yet Respect Your Freedom (RYF) certified by the Free Software Foundation FSF. you should study a little here >> https://puri.sm/why-purism/

while it is true that you can obtain the source code for PureOS (it beeing a Debian based GNU+Linux distribution) it is not ok to asociate Purism with open-source.

open-source is just a precondition in the 4 main freedoms that Richard Stallman was talking about here >> http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/open-source-misses-the-point.html

it’s quite a lot to take in but i’m sure you’ll find plenty to study about Libre Computing and it’s merrits once you get the hang of it.

oh you might want to check QubesOS if you’re more concerned about security and privacy than most. >> https://www.qubes-os.org/intro/

I have had a Librem 13v3 since mid-April. I have been pretty happy with it, and I have managed to avoid some of the issues folks have described in this Forum.

I am not doing what you suggest, and I do not consider myself a security expert. I am very concerned with my privacy, however.

If you have not done so, you may want to check out this thread in the Forum. @eagle started it, and I provided some links to a SANS checklist and other resources there. (You may want to check out the “General security and privacy chat” part of this Forum. It is unclear if you have.)

One link I did not include there is this:

https://www.ghacks.net/overview-firefox-aboutconfig-security-privacy-preferences/

I generally use it to harden or check PureBrowser (Firefox) beyond what Purism has done.

The bad part is that there apparently is no apparmor or firejail support for PureBrowser that I have found. I have been working on the former, but not intensively. I do not like the universal read that is granted to Firefox, and I feel like playing whack-a-mole to some extent, mostly due to my ignorance.

I bought a system with TPM, but I have not used it. It is on my list of things to do. (I used one many years ago.)

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