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Stolen Laptop Alarms
torok writes "Three Engineering students from Simon Fraser University in Burnaby, BC, Canada have developed a laptop alarm complete with remote pager that detects if your laptop is being moved and sounds an alarm. The article is a bit sketchy on details, but it sounds like a cool idea."
Perhaps not exactly the same, but it's already been done for $50.
I am feeling fat and sassy
The idea and actual implementation of the device was done over 5 years ago by some students for the Duracell competition. I don't recall what is it's callled exactly but you can google for it.
http://www.absolute.com - These guys have a bios based application called Computrace Plus. It performs the functions you described above.
A comp is plugged into any sort of web network after being reported stolen and it notifies the 'mothership'.
They even offer a data erase option that can wipe the drive of sensitive data if the computer has been stolen.
But let me ask those folks, how often do you leave your laptop and walk into the next room?
Until Dell starts offering the catheter and colostomy bag options, quite often, actually.
Almost all available theft protection methods for laptops seem not to be working with Linux. So I have setup a survey of theft protection methods, which work for Linux laptops and notebooks. I hope to extend the survey to protection methods for Linux PDAs and mobile (cellular) Linux phones, too.
Hello,
I saw a similar device for sale as Best Buy from Fellowes called a Mobile Proximity Alarm. From looking at their web site it doesn't seem to have a motion detector, but sets of an alarm if the sensor is moved more than fifteen feet from the base. It cost about $30.00USD.
Obviously, it's hard to compare this against something which only exists in prototype form, but has anyone used one of these? If so, how well did it work?
Regards,
Aryeh Goretsky
Dexter is a good dog.
No.
You misread the article in two critical respects that negate your criticisms. (At least you apparently did read the article, or at least skimmed it, which is unusual for Slashdot!)
(1) It consists of two pieces (look at the photo), one that attaches to the laptop (like the LoJack in your car), and one that you carry around (like your LoJack keychain). So when you walk away with the "keychain" in your pocket, the protection turns on automatically. Just like your LoJack.
(2) The protection is active only when the "keychain" is more than 15 feet away, not when it is fewer than 15 feet away! When you're working on the computer, the keychain is fewer than 15 feet away from the computer (assuming you keep it in a pocket) and the alarm is disarmed. When you walk away from the computer - more than 15 feet away - that's when the alarm is armed.
I saw one at Best Buy 3 days ago. Two parts, one on the unit, one in your pocket, alarms if they're more than 15 feet apart. google for proximity alarm site:bestbuy.com - it's sold by Fellowes and costs $30.
For some reason, I thought that an alarm device (like a lock) was already in market where you attach the alarm device to the laptop and the other component you keep with yourself. If the distance between you and the laptop exceeds a certain range, the alarm would go off...
The other thing I remember reading a while ago is there is a company that sells this service where if you subscribe to it and if your computer gets stolen, they can track it by IP address and they actually caught someone where you just install their software that secretly pings their server when you get online. The thief didnt format the stolen laptop's hard disk and just started using it. The owner had informaed this company which then went with the IP address to police and these guys caught the thief...
As an SFU student and somebody that works on the SFU Surrey campus in research, I had the oppertunity to play with the actual prototype that these students put out.
I had my laptop secured with it, to test it out for a day.
Two things with it that I'd like to see rectified:
1. It seemed overly sensative to motions around it, a heavy truck went by outside (~6m away) and it went off.
2. if you use it, you do NOT have any way to cable-tie your laptop to a desk or whatever. yes it could be mutually exclusive, but I think these would be a lot more acceptance of this if you could use it in addition to another device to physically secure your laptop.
ICQ# : 30269588
"I used to be an idealist, but I got mugged by reality."
Oh, and water isn't that deadly to solid-state electronics. Mains yes, batteries no. You might foul the detector (I'm guessing it's peizo) by changing it's resistance, but all that'll do is set it off. It'll take a while for water to kill most things, if at all. Rust will do it in before direct water damage.
...well that's what I think. If a thief knows there is an alarm they probably just dump or trash the laptop (in this case) and the chances of getting it back intact are very remote.
I use LapCop for my powerbook and my desktop for that matter. Combined with a firmware password (stopping anyone reformating your harddrive) you can install it as a invisible application and when your PowerBook is next connected to the internet via the modem or a network it will email you it's new IP information. Hopefully after that you can trace down it location with the help of the ISP it's connected to.
Granted not a good as a GSP based system, but a good and relatively cheap solution.