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Recovering a Lost or Stolen Gadget

Posted by CowboyNeal on from the devices-that-phone-home dept.

gurps_npc writes "The explosion of portable electronic devices, can really weigh you down. Carrying a pager, phone, iPod, camera, and game is quite a lot. Worse, it gives you many more such things to misplace or get stolen. This CNN story discusses some of the retrieval services that help you keep what belongs to you. I particularly like the first one, about a new Singapore-based software that when you download it to your phone, messages everyone in your phone's database whenever a new chip with a new phone number is installed in the phone. This makes it very hard for someone to steal your phone as all your friends get their new phone number."

4 of 94 comments (clear)

  1. I'd like a means to deactivate the device by mrmeval · · Score: 4, Interesting

    when I'm not near it. RFID?

    --
    I'd go on a Vegan diet but the delivery time from Vega is too long. --brownkitty
  2. Bluetooth by nanosquid · · Score: 3, Interesting

    There are various Bluetooth presence software add-ons that will lock your laptop, cell phone, PDA, etc. when it's out of range.

  3. Car alarm for your MacBook by floki · · Score: 3, Interesting

    iAlertU is definitely the coolest way to keep your MacBook (Pro) from being stolen. You can turn it on with your remote control like you do with your car keys. It even features the familiar car locking and unlocking sound. When someone grabs your notebook the fall sensor normally used to shut down your hard disk when a fall is detected activates, the screen starts flashing and an alarm siren goes off. It even snaps a photo of the thief with the built-in iSight webcam and emails it to a predefined address.

    Be sure to check out the YouTube video of the software in action. It really made me laugh just because of the sounds. Can't wait to try that out in my university library :-)

    --
    from the to-stupid-for-words dept.
  4. Re:Software solutions won't do it by AusIV · · Score: 3, Interesting
    I put my money on the non-respectable thieves. I have a laptop that I take every where with me. I keep it close, and I have a lock for it when I leave it unattended (usually just in my apartment). But on the off chance that it ever gets stolen, I also have a daemon installed that will register it's IP address with a remote server as soon as it finds it has a new IP address. While I hope it never comes down to it, I suspect it would be much easier to track down my laptop if it ever got stolen than it would be if I weren't running that daemon.

    A "respectable thief" would boot with a Live CD to collect my personal information before formatting the drive, but a typical thief would more likely just boot it up.

    Like I say, I keep my laptop close, and lock it up when I can't, but I feel a bit more secure knowing my laptop phones home.