Slashdot Mirror
Stolen U.C. Berkeley Laptop Recovered
linuxwrangler writes "Following up on a previous Slashdot story, the laptop with personal data on 98,000 former U.C. Berkeley grad students which was stolen in March has been recovered. Shuki Alburati, A San Francisco State freshman who makes money selling computers and cell-phones online, says he bought the laptop for $300 from a woman who fits the description of the suspect in the original theft. The drive was reformatted and investigators can't tell if the personal info was accessed but they have believed all along that the thief was only interested in the computer. Alburati, who says he was suspicious of someone looking to sell an expensive laptop so cheaply, nonetheless took the woman's word that laptop was not stolen. He then resold the laptop on eBay for $1,159 - just $18,805 short of his bail after police arrested him."
It's illegal to buy a laptop from someone if it turns out that laptop was stolen, even if you didn't know that when you bought it? Is it also illegal for me to think that's excessive?
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Nice to see that, although his instinct is sharp as a tack, he stayed true to his business goals.
I'm not tense. I'm just terribly, terribly, alert.
Whoops. Sorry about that. Try going through this link first. I didn't realize that news providers are looking at the referer when deciding whether they should show the article or not. I just thought the Google links were "special" somehow. :-)
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San Francisco Chronicle
However, said Froshling is SCUM. To buy a $2000+ laptop ($2500, but how old?) (X40 IBM) laptop for $300? He KNEW it was stolen. He's being nothing more than a fence with an EBay account. And he'll get off with just a misdemenor. SCUM!
Test your net with Netalyzr
"Bail is set, to, I don't know, $27,648.33. I'm a judge and I can do what I want."
blarg.
I got arrested for buying a stolen Army laptop, except I didn't get a good deal. I paid basically full price but it was still new in the box. I think that was the only thing that saved my ass. This guy may be in a little trouble for "receiving stolen property". RSP is pretty hard to prove but usually the biggest factor is getting too good of a deal on something. If you have reason to suspect something is stolen, you are guilty of aiding the thief.
This guy bought a ridiculously cheap laptop and then sold it in a public auction. This guy is doubly stupid. I have no pity for him.
Yea but some people dont know what they are selling or dont care, they just want some money for fancy computer thingy. A while back on eBay I found a 3 com 8 port gigabit switch. It was an older model and used it still ran for over a grand. Well it was said to be broken they just plugged it in said the lights didnt light properly and sold it to me for 20 bucks. I plugged it in and used the console cable and what do you know it booted and passed all tests. The admin password was even cleard to default. I then bought 2 gigabit nics to test it and everything worked just like it should. The port lights are screwed up but have no effect on any function. I now have an 8 port layer 3 fully managed gigabit routing switch for 20 bucks.
So yea people are either ignorant of an items value or improperly diagnose its condition. My friend bought an $1100 laptop off ebay for 600. The auction looked legit and they guy had good feedback.
Personal information of nearly a hundred thousand former students has no business whatsoever on a laptop.
Who let this happen? Sheesh... you'd think the birthplace of the *BSD's could work out something a little safer than putting others' personal data on a tiny device that screams "steal me! steal me!" OpenSSH is good (w/ X tunneling if needed) and Remote Desktop (preferably tunneled though SSH) will do the job.
Try 18 USC 1111 (murder, punishable by death or by imprisonment for life) and 18 USC 1201 (kidnapping, punishable by imprisonment for any number of years or for life, or by death if someone dies). These are federal laws.
(Still, you are kind of right; these laws only apply within the special maritime and territorial jurisdiction of the United States, but your statement that there are no federal laws against murder or kidnapping are a little misleading.)
Who ARE you people?
The general Slashdot opinion is
*He was a thief because he bought something at a low price with the intention of selling it - without caring whether it might be non-legitimate
*He was stupid because his greed stopped him from seeing that it was clearly stolen and he could go to jail
You know what? People sell things cheaply all the time! I'd be more concerned at $300 that the thing was a lemon - it would never cross my mind that it had been stolen. I'm an honest person - a fundamentalist. I believe that using a stolen computer is bad karma for me - but you ask and you have to trust other humans. Otherwise you're just another hater.
So you ask the person "why are you selling it?"
And the person answers "Well I'm about to go overseas, I need to get cash pronto for an operation, my wife left me and I'm buying her out of the house" or whatever story the person has. If it's not a valid reason, then you apply your ethical belief appropriately (with extra caution for merchants!)
What sort of paranoid fool checks up on every arrangement she makes? Who does it take to say "I don't believe you - prove that you don't know the value of this item!"
Pawn shops are always full of great deals on specialist items such as camera lenses, because even pawnbrokers don't know the value of things. So why distrust someone selling a computer?
Are you really all so caught up in this culture of fear that you check and double-check everything you do? Just in case the Thought Police come and take you away?
What next? I know, you won't be able to buy a hard drive because what if it once contained copies of songs? In fact, you won't be able to buy the computer used to obtain those copies - and that could be any computer! New network card? Practically fraud! And don't forget your new OEM microsoft software as you buy your shiny new computer! Good consumer!
*#*#*#*#*#******* I love peanut butter sandwiches!