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Free Software Tracking a Stolen Computer?
JeffTL asks: "By necessity, I carry around an Apple iBook running OS X Panther. In the event of its theft, I would like to have the thing send me its IP address, not only for the benefit of law enforcement but also so I could SSH in and trash my personal data with srm, while doing an SFTP backup of anything I forgot to back up. I am not really wanting a subscription, so I am looking for a free-as-in-beer (and if anything beyond a shell script is involved, free-as-in-speech would be much preferred to make sure that no one else is getting anything). Currently, I have a bash script that can create a report, and I am thinking about sending it using either e-mail or FTP. I am considering setting it up to where it only starts barraging me if a specific code is posted to an HTML document of my choice. Is there already something like this in existence somewhere for free? If not, does anyone have any pointers on how this can be done?"
I'd rather lose my computer permanently than have something that makes me think "1984" every time I turn it on (or is it really off?). A measure of privacy in my home (or at least the perception) is worth the price of a computer.
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