Slashdot Mirror
OLPC Has Kill-Switch Theft Deterrent
Sid writes "Ars Technica reports that the One Laptop Per Child (OLPC) XO has an anti-theft daemon in the OS that can be used to remotely disable machines, much like WGA. The Project added the kill switch at the behest of a few countries concerned about laptop theft. From the report, 'OLPC has responded to such concerns by developing an anti-theft daemon that the project claims cannot be disabled, even by a user with root access. Participating countries can then provide identifying information such as a serial number to a given country's OLPC program oversight entity, which can then disable the devices in certain scenarios.'"
Why would anyone steal laptops that are supposed to be so cheap they're going to be everywhere? Won't they be so plentiful and such a commodity that they'll be cheap as dirt and every family will have several? Why would anyone want to steal them? George Orwell's thought police invent a secret, non-root daemon to control theft on every single one of these? What else can it do? It can't be to deter theft, because the history of these things shows they're usually cracked before the thing is officially released. I will be following this story to see what the real reason for including this "feature" is. Keylogger? Censorship? Backdoor for totalitarian governments? The stated reason for theft seems spurious.