Does having a second hard drive in a laptop running Qubes compromise security?

[andrew.t...@gmail.com]

Good afternoon

This is probably a naive question, but anyway...

I am thinkingof trying the Qubes OS (I've been using Linux in various distributions for years so not a complete noob).  The scenario I have in mind is as follows.  A laptop with two SSDs; one will have W10/Linux Mint installed, the other would have Qubes.  Depending on what I want to do, I would boot the laptop from the appropriate SSD (in the fullness of time it is of course possible that I'd use Qubes for most things, but I'll cross that bridge  when I come to it...).

The question I have is: would the presence of the SSD with W10/LM on it have any implications for the security of running Qubes? What if I wanted to use a data partition on the non-Qubes disc?

Thanks in advance.

[unman]

It would have some impact on security, because the /boot partition would
be unencrypted and therefore *possible* that malicious actor coming
from W10/Mint would be able to access it.
Also possible that ma could exfiltrate some(all?) of the encrypted
partition.
Also, that ma could attack BIOS from W10/LM.

You have to judge what risk you expect, and what data you will store in
Qubes. If you are just going to try it out, and not store the details
of your COVID-19 vaccine, then go ahead. You still run risk of BIOS
attack but unless you are a major target it's unlikely.
Of course, once you decide to commit to Qubes you would want to run a
full wipe and reinstall on the Qubes disk. Just in case.

Enjoy Qubes.
Keep safe.