13.Lock StylizedMotherboard

If your Arch Linux computer supports Bluetooth but you’re not using it, it’ll just be wasting power. Instead of turning it off whenever you boot your computer, disable the Bluetooth service instead.

Bluetooth is a convenient way to wirelessly connect all manner of devices to your computer. But if you’re not planning on using Bluetooth, leaving it activated means it’ll be sitting in the background consuming power needlessly. On a laptop that means your battery discharges faster than it needs to.

Depending on how your Bluetooth is configured, it might be broadcasting its ID to other devices too, soliciting connections. This is poor for security and bad for your privacy.

Turning Bluetooth on and off is a trivial matter through your desktop environment. Most desktop environments provide a simple checkbox or slider control to do this. But turning it back on is just as easy, and could be done inadvertently if you, or anyone else, isn’t paying attention.

If you really want to be sure Bluetooth can’t be turned on, disabling it is the safest thing to do. With Bluetooth disabled, it cannot be restored through your desktop environment. Your computer will behave as though it had no Bluetooth hardware installed at all.

The good news is, disabling your Bluetooth is easy when you know how, and it’s just as easy to restore it when you do want to use it. We’re using Arch as the demonstration system, but this will work with all modern systemd-based Linux distributions.