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Which Lost/Stolen Laptop Trackers Do You Like?
saudadelinux writes "I was held up at gunpoint in July, and my laptop was stolen. There are companies out there which, for a fee, install tracker software on your laptop. If it's stolen or lost, they track its whereabouts whenever it gets on the 'Net and work with local law enforcement and ISPs to find the machine. I'm wondering: has anyone used one of these services? Does anyone have a recommendation for which company to go with? My new laptop is a a dual-boot Ubuntu/XP machine, and the couple of companies I've looked at do Windows-only. Are there Linux options?"
A pack of semtex in your laptop.... If you fail to write the correct password after three times, it explodes...
I'm kidding... If those programs can track muggers, they can also track you and that's why I wouldn't trust them. The best way to handle this is to encrypt all your data and insure your laptop against theft. Oh, and daily backups of your data on trusted media which you lock away in a safe.
Essentially, only your data is worth something. The hardware can be covered by insurance.
Ahhh...the great dumpster continuum. Many a free computer will be found there. -- sowth (748135)
Seems to me that you should pass on a tracker that is dependent on an OS. Just how hard would it be to wipe/reinstall? I don't know much about these products, but shouldn't a tracking device be enabled before the OS takes over the 'puter?
I'd bet that these tools are in use with some government departments. You never know, somebody reading this may already be tracked...
I use a built in grenade on a timer you must reset every 24 hours.
I did forget to reset it once with tragic consequences. I really miss that dog.
Oh well, its the price you have to pay for security.
O.J. just wanted those jpegs of him and hoover that were in your documents folder.
You could always have a scheduled task / cron job that combines ifconfig + lynx + a trip to a "what's my ip?" site, dump it to a text file and email it to a webmail address. Might give you an approximation of where it is next time it's networked.
First thing that happens is the laptop gets wiped.
Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from a rigged demo.
LoJack.
The game.
Go check out Undercover from Orbicule. Even if you don't have a Mac you should go read the success stories that they have posted (complete with photos of the perps taken from the Macbooks built-in camera).
so the thief can't use it such that it's worthless to him :)
Either roll your own or wait. If you are lucky, someone will rob Linus Torvalds of his laptop, all production on the kernel will stop while Torvalds and friends crank out a "stolen laptop tracking system" that is greatly superiorthan any other.
If you are really proactive, you could go steal his laptop yourself. That way you have another laptop to use, and you will jumpstart this scenario.
I only look human.
My mother is a halfling and my dad is an ogre, so that makes me an Ogreling
When we have Microsoft Vista tracking our every move on the computer, installing unwanted software, etc.
It seems to me that you can always install some software like that yourself. Once I lost my laptop in my own house. Since I have ipcheck in a cron job, updating my laptop's IP address on DynDns, I just SSHed into it and made it play loud sounds until I found it under the bed. (I don't answer questions about what it was doing there)
find -name "*base*" -exec chown us {} \; ; ln -s
Our University is using CompuTrace/Lo-Jack on our laptops. AFAIK, this is built into the BIOS and is not something that nuking the OS etc can remove. It allows for tracking location OR the option of remotely nuking the data on the drive to stop identity theft. It is a pretty widely used system and I think they are also responsible for the Lo-Jack system that Police Departments use to track physical equipment such as construction equipment when it is stolen. The website is here: http://www.absolute.com/laptop-security-solutions.asp
"To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield." - Tennyson
Buy a gun instead and fight back.
Just set up a cron job to periodically connect to any server that you have access to. Make it connect to an obscure port or just request a non-public file (not indexed nor linked and with a long obscure name to keep crawlers/bots off it). Check your logs and you have the IP address that your thief is using.
If you want top be super paranoid, install a keylogger and set up a cron job to periodically scp the files to an ssh account you own. You would have every password, url, word processor document, etc typed by your attacker.
------ Take away the right to say fuck and you take away the right to say fuck the government.
It is called gcc. Write your own damned code buddy.
sed -e 's/Chuck Norris/Rajnikant/g' joke > fact
Because nobody knows how to remove that little battery inside your computer to reset the BIOS.....
It can't be that hard to send an automated email to a certain address on boot with the IP or to just make a certain request to a server, which will then log the IP, from the init/boot scripts.
:/, but that's not very likely, knowing the relative tech skills of your average gun-toting thief...
If you have a connected desktop as well, even something like ping, netcat, etc. to that machine, could be used.
There are plenty of command-line programs which will send an email (via online servers, etc.).
This could be done via a bash or perl script.
Linux/BSD/Unixy OSs are setup to allow this sort of simple scriptable configuration...
The only snag is if they just boot off of a CD and wipe the hard-drive
BIOS trackers anyone?
There is no psychiatrist in the world like a puppy licking your face - Ben Williams
Dell has been embedding Absolute's Computrace in many of their laptops (I'm typing this on a SuSE 10.2 install on a Dell Latitude D820 that has it enabled). Once you enable it in the BIOS, there is no way to disable it without physically removing and replacing the chip.
"Powers. I have them."
Usually, the password can be reset with clearing the bios, usually by moving the jumper.
import system.cool.Sig;
Well for Windows I can tell you LoJack for laptop sucks. You should try creating your own script. See the thing with Windows crapaganda based "trackers" is they mainly track to src IP of wherever their little daemons call from. Means nothing since most ISP's won't provide you with an IOTA of information without a court order. In most cases in bigger cities, your machine will be wiped by the pawn shop owner.
If you want something truly truly effective, talk to a vet about something similar to Verichip. Find out whether you can perhaps open up the machine and place it somewhere. Anything else would have to be IP based. For that matter a shell script will tell you what network your machine is coming from, nothing more. Unless you get creative but chances are if its stolen 1) it will be sanitized from all software 2) HIGHLY likely anything NIX based will automatically be wiped unless its swiped at say Linuxworld Op or something
Infiltrated dot Net
It's terrible that you were held up at gunpoint.
Did you recognize any of the assailants? If you can identify one of them as a former Heisman Trophy winner, I'd like to negotiate a book deal.
Richard B. Cheney's laptop with his oil futures trades the best.
PatRIOTically,
K. Trout
If those programs can track muggers, they can also track you and that's why I wouldn't trust them. The best way to handle this is to encrypt all your data and insure your laptop against theft. Oh, and daily backups of your data on trusted media which you lock away in a safe.
Essentially, only your data is worth something. The hardware can be covered by insurance.
Agreed. Hands down, this is the best solution, and it will save you in many cases other than theft where you lose data. Modern laptops come with support for hardware acceleration of crypto (those blasted TPM chips) that can be turned in your favor.
While it's nice to maybe one day find your thief, it's not worth the security and privacy trade-off in my opinion. Besides, you should be encrypting a laptop anyway just as a matter of policy.
If it's for-profit but free, you're not the customer -- you're the product (e.g., the Slashdot Beta's "audience").
to use a weapon of your own.
I just HAVE to say it:
:)
who on EARTH will steal a linux laptop???
just kidding, I use ubuntu myself
Seven puppies were harmed during the making of this post.
Even with an IP address, postal address, and mapquest directions to the thief's house, I have a hard time believing an officer will put down his chocolate iced donut to go knock on doors over a laptop.
Camping on quad since 1996.
I'm typing this on your laptop which I just reformatted and am selling in less than 24 hours GL finding someone else to track
3
When somebody sucks at first-posting, you've got to assume they just plain suck at life.
I hear he is pretty good at tracking.
If you have Linux on your laptop, they won't be able to figure out how to get on the net anyway, especially via wireless. :)
My beliefs do not require that you agree with them.
The thieves would have a harder time wiping that, and if it looks "normal" enough they might not suspect that the machine is reporting itself. But there are not many choices of machines on which it's possible...
I had, er, still have but no longer use, a laptop that had a Stop Security Plate on it. The basic idea is that it has contact information on it that anyone can call and verify the ownership of the property. If the plate is removed, it leaves a permanent mark on the property indicating it is stolen property. The nice thing about this product is that it is not software based, so it will work on anything with a large enough flat spot to glue the plate to.
Slashdot is an anagram for Has Dolts, and I am Dolt number 468543
There are two reasons to care about a lost/stolen laptop: 1) losing the value of the laptop itself, and 2) the value of the data within.
For the value of the laptop itself, I would argue that the cost of any tracking solutions is bound to be more than (the chance of laptop being stolen x value of laptop itself). This comes down to the age-old question of 'whether or not to buy insurance'. In this case, it's just not worth it - especially considering that you're buying insurance that may or may not 'pay' in the event of a loss!
Regarding the value of the data contained in the laptop, my reasoning is that if you are carrying around data that is *truly* valuable, then being able to get the laptop back if stolen is the least of your worries. If you are not responsible enough to keep valuable data either by your side at all times, or in a safe place, then you aren't responsible enough to be working with said data to begin with. Secondly, if people are clever enough to track down a laptop with valuable data in the pursuit of corporate/governmental espionage - they're damn well clever enough not to hook the thing up to the internet. Finally, if by some chance the swipers decide to drop the thing off at the pawn shop in order to make an extra $100 (yeah right), by the time you get the laptop back the real damage has been done anyway.
Summary: tracking services = waste of time. -JT
the DHS has found a way to pay for citizen surveillance without using taxpayer dollars.
"National Security is the chief cause of national insecurity." - Celine's First Law
I was part of a laptop fencing ring for some time. Basically, we had a few guys who'd go out and steal electronics (mostly laptops, actually), and then they'd bring them to me for "cleaning", then I'd hand them off to another guy for liquidation. Granted, I'm sure there are plenty of thugs out there who'd steal a laptop, then hook it right up to get their pr0n fix. Some people are more sophisticated. Really, having been on that side of things, I don't trust any software solution for this, because they're too easily defeated by someone with only a cursory knowledge of computers, let alone a competent techie.
Speak softly and carry a big stick...and hit him with it. Unless he's got you at gunpoint...where on earth were you that you got held at gunpoint for a laptop, anyway?
Quiz: True or False -- On a scale of 1 to 10, what is your middle name?
"with their freedom lost all virtue lose" - Milton
Myself, I don't worry so much about the cost of replacement hardware. Data in unauthorized hands is a bigger worry. I think that an encrypted filesystem is the most important priority, and there are a number of ways that can be done, including pre-boot.
But the best data protection solution is to not carry it at all. If you're net-enabled, is to just use a thin-client terminal laptop. built-in vpn and you can get your remote desktop on the thin client anywhere you have net connectivity, and if the thin client's stolen, there is no need to worry about the data, since it's on the server, not on the thin client.
It's too bad you already bought a new notebook, as several manufacturers sell notebooks that have the "phone home" software in the BIOS. There is no dependence on the OS you are running.
1. Set up a DynDNS account, and do the pay thing for "ownership" of the dns name for a time.
2. Set up on Linux a DynDNS client updater. Do the same for Windows.
3. Set up a secure rootkit with your authentication. Use kernel module hiders and use the kmod that hides certain port sniffing.. Its in HoneyD
When you deal with a thief...
4. Locate the IP address via DynDNS. Log into the stolen machine.
5. Stream the audio from mics (pipe it from raw device to mp3 and send compressed). Do the same with webcam if it works with Linux
6. Go then show up and stick that fucker up with a gun. See how he likes it.
"I want my laptop back.."
How much are you going to pay for the software and then how much are you going to pay for monthly fee? Is it worth it? For a computer?
As another read said here, the only thing really worth anything is your data. Back it up and save it. Encrypt it on your disk.
Is it really worth it to pay possibly 10% of the new value of the computer, if not more, to maybe catch someone who stole it in the unlikely event it gets stolen?
Using software like this reminds me of buying a lot of warranties. They generally aren't worth it when the risk/reward is measured. I've owned plenty of laptops and never had one taken from me. I don't know anyone that has had one taken from them. I know it *can* happen and *does* happen. But I also know that it only happens to a very small fraction of laptops.
And seriously, just because someone has your old laptop doesn't mean they are the ones that took it. It very well could have been fenced a few times and stories are likely to be made up and a conviction is probably unlikely. Do you really think police forces are going to spend all day tracking down a laptop theft?
"If you are a dreamer, a wisher, a liar, A hope-er, a pray-er, a magic bean buyer
It would also be very interesting to know if said service is available outside the US, does anyone know about that?
software can be deleted, chances are the hard drive will be wiped, so all ur data's already gone
really the best idea is to call chuck norris, and convince him roundhouse kick every laptop thief in the universe.
sigs... don't talk to me about sigs....
Dude, where's my laptop?
But seriously, folks. I don't understand how laptops get stolen. I mean, isn't it mostly carelessness and lack of knowledge of environmental variables that cause laptop theft? I have seen people at local hotspots actually get up to grab something to eat, or go pee, or whatever, and leave their laptop sitting in "their space". It kills me.
If you trust no one, you'll miss nothing. I won't reiterate on backups and blah blah blah, because nobody does them anyways.
They'll have to pry my MBP from my hot sweaty hands and cold dead body.
End of story.
The older I get, the less I like everyone else.
This is why I carry my own pistol in accordance with my state laws. Also you might want to consider watching ebay and craigslist. It will prolly eventually turn up there.
random bodily fluids all over the laptop. Nobody will want to come near it, let alone steal it.
Monstar L
A decent alternative has nothing to do with the OS or the BIOS. There are a number of security devices available, but I like this method:
- The laptop (or laptop bag) has a module on/in it.
- There is a another module that fits e.g. in your pocket.
- If the distance between Module A and Module B exceeds N meters (configurable, and/or varies by product), the modules generate a loud and piercing alarm.
The idea is that the thief will become unnerved and will drop the stolen item.
I want to drag this out as long as possible. Bring me my protractor.
I can't see how anything that isn't tied to BIOS could possibly survive a DBAN erasure, or even a simple dd if=/dev/zero of=/dev/hda from a linux live CD. This pretty much rules out anything that isn't from the manufacturer. I think there's a lot of snake-oil in this area, partially because it catches the idiots who comprise the majority of criminals. If mediocre security products are vindicated by the fact most criminals are idiots, then I guess this is OK in some twisted fashion. LoJack for Laptop's 75% recovery rate I guess justifies the expense for a large organization.
...to spyware? Doubt it.
the most effective solution would involve a GPS receiver. but it's going to be difficult hiding it in/on the case, and the software that uploads the info probably wont survive an OS reinstall.
Since most morons who would risk jail time to steal your laptop wouldn't be the time that can figure out Linux, I would expect the first thing that happens to your machine will be a hard drive wipe and an install of pirated XP.
even for my home computer. Whay not use a seperate laptop hd in an enclosure to store your data and use the laptops hd to just store applications. CF cards are also getting pretty cheap now days with 16BG of storage. Plenty of storge to keep document type files stored on the CF card. Its so small you can just stick it into your sock and no one will know. They might steal your laptop but not your data as who would want a CF card smelling like cheese.
by TheSpoom (715771) Uncaring Linux user here. I have nothing to add to this but please continue. *munches popcorn*
yes it is available for laptops and it is a hardware solution that does not require the laptop to be on to function.
The kind that doesn't let 'em catch me!
I looked into installing one of the phone home tracker on a recent laptop purchase and decided against it.
Even if the device worked and reported the IP address and the IP address could be localized would anyone do anything about it? In most big cities if your car is stolen or your home is robbed you might get a police to come out and look in a day or two. Most likely, you'll just get the answer to file a police report and call your insurance company. Somehow, I doubt if the cops are going to do a dragnet to recover a couple hundred dollar laptop.
Secondly, as a Windows user I've learned that the more crapware and especially drivers that you install the less stable your machine is. I decided that the risk of a crappy driver causing a crash is probably worse than the slight chance of recovering a machine.
If I was really concerned about the data, I'd go with the full TPM encryption route (Vista bitlocker) and maybe the remote wipe.
A good lock is probably a better investment.
The write up wasn't tailored for the home user it was written to make those in industry aware of the false representation Absolute was dishing out. "Track anyone". For me in the IT industry at a Fortune500 that means mitigating against corporate theft/espionage. As an IT/security/network/insert_other_titles_here engineer my main concern was being able to remotely wipe the machines in the event of a compromise - something Absolute states they could do. Oh yea, how are they going to wipe it from a company conducting corporate espionage. Do you think that companies that go this route (corporate espionage) hire rookies or someone off the street to swipe laptops loaded with company secrets. As a deterrence to lowly home machines sure, as a "corporate" protection tool it lacks. I'd stick with encryption to protect data else a thief is left with wiping it and having plastic, an LCD and metal.
Infiltrated dot Net
and believe what it tells them.
Just periodically have it pop up a dialog that says something like "To begin routine maintenance, please enter the password otherwise click cancel"
The if they fail to enter the password, it shoots you an email the contain a trace from it to google.com, or some other site that is unlikely to move. If it connects through a wireless device, be sure to have it email that info as well. Also turn on a key logger and get that information. It's actually pretty easy to do. Could probably be written in less then an hour.
Do it once a day until you can turn it off. This can get you a pretty good idea of it's location.
You could open up a shell and have it pop up a message that tells the person they had better return the laptop or you will go to the police. If it has a built in camera, take is picture and let him know.
You could hire someone to be an intermediary so the person never sees you. and as far as you tell him, ensures that you never see him. Probably get somebody to do it for 50 bucks. Hell, spend 200 bucks and ask a lawyer to be the intermediary at his office.
It might be handy to make it look like there is something valuable in the data so the thief doesn't want to wipe it. Most unprofessional thieves will want to snoop.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
To me, the most vitally important aspect is going for something that is hardware based. With TPM enabled bios and such these days on a modern laptop, the client is embedded and does not rely on your OS whatsoever. This is great considering most of what we seem to be discussing in this thread is Linux.
CompuTrace worked so well that in our tests (and later, based on four thefts out of 300 systems) that we noted the following: - I can wipe the hard drive (even low-level format) and the system will _still_ phone home immediately once on the Internet. - If you take the hard drive out and place it in a different system, _THAT_ system _also_ phoned home, based on the TPM components there.
(This was mostly HP TC4200 and HP TC4400 tablets.)
www.absolute.com
...the good guys carry guns too and as far as I know, lethal force is justified in Texas if used to protect either life or property. Call it Southern Justice.
1. Use a solder iron and carve your name/company name in large letters into the plastic of the laptop.
2. No thief would ever be able to sell it. Thus not steal it.
There must be an easy way to have a GPS solution to this. GPS modules are quite cheap these days and (although I'm no expert) there must be some way of having a little hardware chip that is separate from the HD that can connect out via the network card once the laptop is powered up. A full on expert would be able to circumvent it sure but for 99% of thefts it would probably be unseen within the case somewhere.
Then simply go round to where the GPS signal comes from and kick some serious arse.
Unfortunately most Dynamic DNS systems don't provide a log of IP and when the system was fired up, but still they are set the last address the PC was running on.
So if the computer was ever booted somewhere, you'd have that IP.
I can't imagine any of these trackers could provide anything more then an IP the computer was used from.
John
I am always doing that which I can not do, in order that I may learn how to do it. - Pablo Picasso
It is not hard to write a quick PERL script that sends a packet to a server you control at boot up and /or at regular intervals. The server would just need to record the IP and time you checked in. This takes it off of some 'tracking' company's server and keeps the data in your control and you still have the history of where the machine was used. Not perfect but if someone were motivated they could make it a bit more complex (ssl etc) with a little bit more time.
As stated before: cron a bash script,
Remind me to try that (smuggling milkbones, that is) next time I fly somewhere. Boy, would that be a funny misunderstanding. Well, for some definitions of the word "funny".
Ben Hocking
Need a professional organizer?
Your car might drive you into the ground first. Please make sure, for your sake and others', that you're at least keeping your car safe.
Ben Hocking
Need a professional organizer?
$69 bucks for 3 years or the economic life of the machine. It's not perfect but it's something. In a college environment, a stolen laptop is bound to kept on campus and used by someone else so it's somewhat easier to find.
Buy a gun. Take a martial arts class. Be wary of your surroundings.
God bless America.
Youa re armed, walking down the street. Someone points a gun at you and demands your laptop. Are you seriously suggesting you want to try a get your gun to defend yourself before they pull the trigger?
They would steal your gun as well.
A family member was going to work a 2AM and someone pulled up next to them and fired a round into the vehicle. My family member then hit the accelerator and took off at high speed until he found a police car.
Your post reminds me of the idiots who said "You should have got your gun out and shot back."
When someone is pointing their gun right at you, it is to late to draw your gun. now, if you believe your going to die anyways, go for it. Other then that don't risk your life foolishly over a laptop.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
> I think it's a foregone conclusion that there's a reset jumper somewhere on the MacBook. You and
> I not knowing where it is doesn't make it any less so.
Or not. Laptop makers have become serious about security because so many customers demanded it. Not sure what Apple is doing exactly, but if a Thinkpad has a hard drive password set the only way to defeat it is to send the whole unit along with either documentation proving ownership or LEO creds to one of a select group of data recovery houses. The drive password is stored on a chip inside the drive bubble as well as in the CMOS memory. So pulling the backup battery only gives you a brick.
Pulling the drive and trying to read it from another computer also fails, again because of the drive password kept in the drive itself. So if you don't have a passwordless guest account and properly protect the boot sequence to prevent booting from alternate media you can lock a laptop down to the point it is only a few spare parts to a thief.
That said, I can still think of ways to defeat the security but none that a typical 'gangster' kiddie could attempt.
Democrat delenda est
http://www.orbicule.com/undercover/
I use that on my mac machines. I know it's not linux specifically but I just thought I'd toss that out there. It uses the built-in cam to take clandestine photos, too...
Seems like there are many issues here with software solutions. First thing I would do if i stole a laptop would be reformat it (after looking for awesome stuff on it.) But I would not connect it to the internet without reformatting it for fear of these solutions. I especially wouldnt sell it without it being reformatted. Any software solution can be disabled, and for mainstream ones, it would be easy to find. Unless maybe sony could make a rootkit solution for you. Stick it in the bios and some one smart would turn it off before hand. Still, with all the problems, preventative/reactive is better than nothing I suppose.
insight through the mind
Anyone know of a service that will send out a gunman to rob me of my laptop so my insurance company will buy me a new one? Can I sign up for the every-six-months plan?
I would prefer a BIOS solution with a password on administrator. How would you track the laptop... traceroute? GPS location would be more exact but then... they could track the users as well as the abusers...
Codifex Maximus ~ In search of... a shorter sig.
> I'm willing to bet a free program could be almost as useful, with maybe a bit more work if the thing is stolen.
No it couldn't. The software is trivial. A program that sends a web request with the serial number embedded in the url a few seconds after a network interface comes up is all that is needed. But once you know your laptop is at IP x.x.x.x that doesn't do YOU a damned bit of good. No ISP is stupid enough to give you the IP+timestamp to physical connection point mapping for liability reasons. Think it through and imagine the Pandora's Box doing that would open. That is what you are actually buying from the tracking company, their preestablished relationships with law enforcement and the ISP community. Once known and trusted as a laptop tracking company they CAN get that info into the hands of law enforcement. Although I bet for legal reasons the tracking company itself NEVER sees the phone number/node/physical address.
Democrat delenda est
How to setup a LoJack system for your laptop
* Read #General Notes
* Read #How to add extra repositories
* Read #How to use dynamic IP addressing for your host using the free DynDNS service
* Read #Maintain Dynamic IP address with ddclient utility
* If your laptop is stolen and then subsequently connected to the Internet, you will be able to find out from which IP address it connects to the Internet, by this method.
* Get a free dynamic IP account from one of the many providers, such as DynDNS. Read #How to use dynamic IP addressing for your host using the free DynDNS service. Remember the hostname you set up, such as yourhostname.dyndns.org.
* Install ddclient. Read #Maintain Dynamic IP address with ddclient utility. Ddclient updates the IP address at DynDNS every 5 minutes by default (unless you change it).
* The hostname (yourhostname.dyndns.org in the example) that you registered with your dynamic IP service (i.e. DynDNS) should be updated whenever someone runs your computer, stolen or not. You can find out from which IP address the computer was last run by using the ping command:
ping yourhostname.dyndns.org
* You can then look up the IP address with a reverse IP service and at least get an idea in what city your laptop is in. Of course, if the IP address resolves to one of a large bank of addresses used by an ISP provider, such as AT&T, you may not be helped much by this method.
I have this product as well. I think I'm very satisfied with it, but I won't really know for sure until my MacBook is stolen.
So hopefully I'll never be sure...
Bigtime Consulting - "We're the best because we cost the most"
Damn. If I only had mod points today.
Afterall, if you have a password on your machine, they aren't going to easily boot up the computer.
And that's exactly the problem with a software based solution. If you can't log in to the machine, you can't run apps. Plus, faced with this, the criminal will just wipe and reinstall anyway.
So, either remove the password protection from your laptop, or use and expensive hardware-based device. or just make sure all your stuff's backed up.
Linux, you magnificent bastard, I read the fucking manual!
I wrote such a small program myself recently; it pings a server at regular intervals which then records the IP and some additional info into a database. It runs on linux or as a service on windows. It's only about 700+ lines of code and pretty simple. The commercial services that do this probably have much better software which is hard to remove, or even better, they use some hardware device to achieve this.
But the real problem is recovering the laptop after it's been stolen. If you use the commercial services, then those people will take care of that and will contact the ISP and the law enforcement, etc. What would interest me much more is: What can I do to recover my laptop if it gets stolen and I'm not using any of those services, but my tracker got me an IP? Is there any chance an ISP will listen to me if I claim one of their costumers is a thief? Would the police listen? How should I go about doing all that?
I had a $50 POS Thinkpad that I used to take with me to the library, leaving my new laptop at home. Since I didn't give a crap whether or not someone stole my Thinkpad, I decided to have a little bit of fun with it. First, I wrote my phone number on a white label, which I stuck inside the battery case. Criminals are stupid.
Then I edited my Windows registry so that when the computer was booted up, a 'warning' message would appear from the Department of Homeland Security. Second screen was a reminder that this was a Top Secret computer, and they could go to jail for ten years if this computer didn't belong to them.
The only reason I even bothered to put my phone number inside the battery case was so that the police would know who to call when the idjit thief got scared and ditched the computer.
(This is why I don't have a husband. I'm too much of a computer geek.)
Here's a Microsoft link explaining how to make a logon warning script.
http://www.microsoft.com/technet/scriptcenter/resources/qanda/jan05/hey0117.mspx
And information about putting a DOD related warning banner.
http://www.antionline.com/archive/index.php/t-233933.html
... BOINC? http://science.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=07/02/21/2326240
Just set up a cron job on your laptop to run traceroute to some arbitrary place (say google) and email you the output twice a day.
Have the spam filter on your inbox just toss the email away until the day you need it.
It does rely on the thief not knowing enough to fire up linux in sngle-user mode and kill your crontab entry, which is probably a safe bet.
Or (more likely) to just blow away your whole linux partition with a fresh windows install, but that would even affect a commercial product the same, unless it was hardware-based.
Sounds like you should have carried laptop protection by Smith & Wesson.
What I would like to see is an application that makes a deal with Verizon, AT&T, etc. to use the built in wireless chip to phone in GPS coordinates on each boot and shutdown. Yes, this does not stop people that wipe the hard drive, but tell me the truth, how many "smash and grab" or "opportunistic" thieves have that level of technical ability? Couple this with a requirement for pawn shops to startup laptops at least once and you should see a serious increase in laptop recovery.
That'll get your laptop back, AND get you some satisfaction.
My bicyles
Nobodys going to steal your six year old, fifteen pound laptop running Ubunghole... unless it's an accident.
You don't need laptop tracking software, you just need a luggage tag to let them know where to drop it off at. I'm sure you don't even have to offer a reward: being able to point and laugh at the dork should be rewarding enough.
You should get insurance for your laptop, so that if it gets stolen, you get a new one from the insurance company.
You should also goto the police and report the theft.
You should use full disk encryption.
* http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Full_disk_encryption
You might also want to get a Desert Eagle.
I also have to wonder what kind of priority is going to be given to recovering a stolen laptop with a value of under $2000
That's a jailable felony theft. If you've got any leads the cops think could help direct them to solving the case, they'll chase it. Cops' performance is measured by number of arrests, and felony arrests are weighted higher than traffic tickets.
So many of these laptops have digital cameras built into the display. Perhaps a good recovery technique would be to have your own login and a guest account. If anyone ever logs into the guest account (no pw required), then as soon as the desktop comes up, a photo could be snapped of the user and emailed to your account with the IP address, etc. If no internet access is available, it could save the photos to the HD, then the first time internet access is available, it could email all the photos. This would be helpful because it would likely contain photos of the actual thief checking out the laptop and then the customer who bought it and is currently in possession of the stolen equipment.
Seth
$5 / month hosted VPS on linux = awesome!
I've got a Dell Inspiron 6000 that is a bit over a year old. It already has some sort of lo-jack built into the bios. I don't know the name of it but it says that if you turn it on it can't be turned off. I would assume that it is OS independent. I myself would never turn something like this on because I like some of you am a paranoid freak. I would much rather some thief owned my laptop that have some unknown entity know where I am at every time my laptop hits the net.
I'm not sure if it's the same for Intel Macs now but I had a PowerMac G4 that had a password script stored in the NVRAM. You could not change the boot drive nor could you swap out the hard drive. The only way to get around it was to change the motherboard. In a moment of weakness I disabled it because I got tired of having to walk re-enter the password everytime. A few months later my place gets robbed while I was out of town. I keep praying that somehow the nvram will reset itself and the script will start running again. I left my phone number and email as part of the MOTD. But its been almost 2 years.
I'm surprised nobody has mentioned BOINC as a tracker. At least the whenever the seti@home BOINC project connects to it's servers, it will log the IP address that it connected from (So you can easily log into your seti@home account and find out), enabling law enforcement agencies to track down where your stolen laptop is/was connected to an internet gateway. Of course this works for linux and windows versions of BOINC, why wouldn't it.
...therefore you should have been exercising your 2nd amendment rights and shot the bastard.
When I was working at CompUSA, there was a guy there in the tech shop that wiped/reimaged stolen laptops at home for thieves. He got a pretty decent cut for his time, and none of these laptop lojack POSes would come close to surviving that. Use the BIOS password backdoor (they seem to all have them), clear out the BIOS passwords and reset the CMOS, then wipe out the hard disk a few passes and restore a factory Dell/HP/whoever image of XP Home (seems like 99% of stolen laptops were set for XP Home). He got from 50-100$ for about 15 minutes work and about an hour or two of wall socket/desk time. The thieves then sold them at pawnshops or on eBay for a few hundred bucks and the software side was clean and untraceable. He did get escorted from work in handcuffs eventually, since the serial numbers were intact and the one thief squealed like a little girl when eBay and the feds tracked him down. The software trackers were a big scam, though. Very little chance of return on investment.
The preceding comment is my own, and in no way construes an opinon of the Emperor of Mankind.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shadow_Wolves
They always find what they're told to find and they're easily disposed of.
of the two dell inspirons i have owned, both have had an option in the bios to activate some sort of tracking module, that i believe phones home reguarly to combat theft. it was a matter of once its activated you cant (aparently) turn it off, so i never did turn it on, but i assumed that it must run independently of the OS as it was activated in the bios.
An oxford student managed to capture some crispy clear pictures of the burglar who stole his laptop computer... he had a webcam which periodically took a picture and sent to to his private web page while the machine was on. And the OS was Linux.
Ben Park mugshots
Vintage computer adverts: http://www.vintageadbrowser.com/computers-and-software-ads
....but the last used laptop I bought had a STOP sticker on it. I couldn't get the sticker off, so I called the number. Fortunately, my laptop wasn't stolen. The STOP people re-registered the laptop in my name for free. There is supposedly a permanent "tattoo" underneath the sticker. No, I have not pried it off to look. The sticker is very ugly, by the way.
Remember guns don't kill people, they are harmless things.
If you're a LastFM user you can see what kind of music the person who stole your laptop enjoys... It seems like they would have they ability to track your laptop, since it's sending them information every time music is played.
so that I can avoid living there?
Held up at gunpoint? Geez
Is this a software solution? I'm guessing due to the only windows functionality. If it is, how is it any good? the moment thieves or buyers of the stolen goods are aware of this, they' ll just dump the hard drive.
There are many cases where this doesn't happen. Yes If someone was smart and a professional, they would do this from a boot disk. OTOH, if someone knew that they could get a job the pays well enough they won't need to 100 bucks they would get from pawning a laptop.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
My advice is to save your money. As other people have observed, the police are unlikely to investigate your stolen laptop even if you give them the name, phone number and home address of the thief.
While working for an ISP last year I was contacted by a corporation using laptop tracking software because their stolen laptop had phoned home from one of our IP addresses. When the investigating officer found out that the laptop had been spotted in Portland, Oregon, he declined to even contact the local police. The Portland police have a well established reputation for ignoring the "small" stuff, like large-scale car theft rings, and aren't the least bit interested in a case involving a single laptop.
Since the ISP had a privacy policy that didn't allow subscriber information to be released without a subpoena, I could not tell the laptop owner anything about the subscriber whose premises apparently held the laptop. Besides, maybe he just had an open wireless network? Even so, assuming the subscriber was the thief, and assuming you were willing to kick his door in and take the laptop back... well, OJ has recently demonstrated that this is probably not the smart thing to do.
Its very simple. When the machine boots, if you don't login successfully after 10 or so seconds, then it phones home. I don't see why people are always screaming about "OMGOMGOMGOMGOMG IT TRACKS YOU TOO I HATES IT!111?!?eleventy-one". Its a simple fix.
Obligatory blog plug: http://www.caseybanner.ca/
I wish I hadn't, um, mistyped that in the first place. Damn typos.
Ben Hocking
Need a professional organizer?
I personally feel safer with a noodly appendage protection plan...
For anything near-reliable, I would use a radio transmitter hidden within the laptop to go off on a long-range transmission (kilometres) if it can't pick up the presence of a receiver within short-range (a hundred metres, e.g. in your keychain).
That and a bit of radio location will make a fun family trip.
Take off every 'ZIG' !!
The correct way to do this is to reverse the ip address and find out who owns that netblock. Then you call law enforcement in that area that has juristiction and THEY take it from there. Been through that once. We got a call from a sherriff due to a hot credit card charged from our location. They will not give YOU the information, but if they are dilligent they will take the information that you provide and will take it from there.
In this case, lets say the thief stole it from your car and took it home and logged into your guest account and browsed the web. (left there to entice them to play with it rather than reformat it) So your server logs the IP address, and it's (fortunately) from your local cable company. So you call your county sherriff or police department and report it. THEY will not give you jack. (nor will the cable co) But the sherriff can go ask for the records, and more often than not, even without a court order, they will get them. (legally it probably requires a warrant, but for reasonable minor requests from a badge they sometimes just give it up) From there it may be of varying degrees of difficulty, it may be as simple as the sherriff going to the guy's house and politely asking for what he "borrowed". Or it may require a search warrant. The warrant is easy to get if the suspect has priors for larceny and you have even weak evidence.
I work for the Department of Redundancy Department.
If you have a password required to log in to the laptop in the first place.
That's the sad thing, if you lower your security so it just boots up and logs in, your app will likely work and connect to the net, allowing you to track them down, but people can also log straight in and access your data too.
A double edged sword indeed.
I know we're all "Oooh, Linux" around here, but most people in the rest of the world are used to Windows. So just make the boot loader go away quickly, and make the default boot Windows. Then, if it's stolen, the thief will most likely run Windows, and you can use a Windows tracker.
Or you could just buy some insurance, encrypt sensitive stuff, do backups and not worry about it.
The preferred solution is to not have a problem.
Police don't care. See this recent Broadband/DSL Reports security forum thread about a guy losing his laptop/notebook, trying to see if he can format his HDD remotely since someone was using it online, police not caring, etc.
Ant(Dude) @ Quality Foraged Links (AQFL.net) & The Ant Farm (antfarm.ma.cx / antfarm.home.dhs.org).
All you have to do is get a shock collar / invisible fence system that's meant to keep your dog within 100ft of you and modify it to pump out a lot more voltage, put the dog-unit into your laptop case and cover the case with wire mesh, alternatively you can just rig it up like one of those Deadlock collars from that terrible movie. (C-4 / other low explosive) PROBLEM SOLVED!!
Not all life is cyber. Extra Income
... did you have to enter 4 8 15 16 23 42?
Ant(Dude) @ Quality Foraged Links (AQFL.net) & The Ant Farm (antfarm.ma.cx / antfarm.home.dhs.org).
HTML version courtesy of Google.com
Orbicule and Lojackforlaptops, since they run on Macs and Mac's OS X is sitting on top of Darwin ( Unix) either should to the trick. Kyle
Does you have any recommendations for laptop tracker software?
I could change the HD on my old IBM laptop faster blindfolded than I could on my wife's Mac.
I really like this idea. Cheap and easy to implement.
Peter predicted that you would "deliberately forget" creation 2000 years ago...
Here where I work, we had a laptop stolen and we sought some kind of tracking solution.
Like some others here, I used ddns. The nice thing about it is that there are already a bunch of free clients for Linux and Windows that integrate nicely with the IP stack and update the dns whenever they see the net.
I actually went a little further and ran my own DDNS server here at work so that a daemon could watch the logs and notify me immediately whenever there was any activity from "laptop28" or whatever. This requires that you generate a ddns key and configure BIND to allow updates, etc. So, it's a bit of a pain... but manageable. Otherwise, your alternative is to use a free service and then poll the external dns server for changes.
You think that's hilarious?
Watch some dumb criminal shows sometime. They've actually had cases where the crook attempts to steal a security camera - setting up a ladder, climbing up and presenting a nice closeup shot of his face as you see his hands move past the viewpoint of the camera, holding a screwdriver...
I don't read AC A human right
I'm a fan of putting a sticker on the bottom of the laptop that has your contact information and an offer of a no-questions-asked reward for it's return. You can put it over the Microsoft sticker, if you are unfortunate enough to have paid the Microsoft tax (potentially with a piece of paper over the license preventing permanent damage to preserve resale value). You could even use one of the semi-permenent stickers carried by most office supply stores for tagging inventory. This same info could be placed in a grub splash screen protected by a password. This would seem to me to be more likely to get a laptop returned than the chances of it being successfully traced, even if it was booted in a place with net access. However, some ideas for scripts to act as a lo-jack system or a backdoor (which could be augmented with grabbing the camera pics from laptops so equipped) can be found in an old 2600 article:
http://conigs.com.nyud.net:8090/static/misc/laptop.html
jackbox
Absolute Software might have what you want:
Absolute BIOS-Level Protection
(Disclaimer: Not involved with these guys at all -- did a training session with some of their developers several years ago, and was impressed by their pitch)
What does it mean to wake out of a dream
and be wearing someone else's shorts?
BNL, Born on a Pirate Ship (1998)
This kind. You know, where the laptop comes back (with maybe a few bullet holes) but the thieves don't.
The higher the technology, the sharper that two-edged sword.
I would think, assuming your laptop has wireless internet capability, that you could set it up with a cron job to periodically wget an unusually-named non-existent file from some web server where you have access to the error log That gives you its IP address on a regular basis, and in the event that it's stolen traceroute will presumably tell you more or less where it's connected. Even if all it tells you is the ISP, that's a starting point.
Of course, if your laptop has a GPS receiver, then you could have the cron job actually transmit its coordinates somewhere -- say, email them to your gmail account every five minutes.
All of this relies on the thief taking the laptop someplace where it can get signal, but I don't see how that can be avoided in principle. Even if you give the laptop a full-time cellular connection, it's still gotta be able to get at least a cell-tower signal, in order to send any information anywhere.
Cut that out, or I will ship you to Norilsk in a box.
...all individually posted on eBay.
...and, yeah, the police are so abundantly aware of this they won't even take the time to finish chewing, much less put the donut down.
Even stupid thieves understand the concept of the "chop shop" and the ones that are too stupid to do it themselves will sell it to someone who isn't. Your laptop may be worth $1000 to you, but it's worth $50 of crank to the original thief and double what you paid for it parted out to an organized shop in the next state.
http://www.absolute.com/products-core-technology.asp:
"If the hard drive is reformatted or replaced, the Computrace Agent support in the BIOS rebuilds the necessary application files on the hard drive as required by the customer."
So, if I wipe it and install Linux on reiserfs or something even less well known, its gonna read that, modify my files and boot config just so, and then launch this computrace software natively in linux (they couldn't depend on WINE being installed)?
Or what happens if I install an O/S using an encrypted filesystem? Where are you going to write your native client if the disk is all encrypted garbage?
Also, if you guys developed a Linux version, why not say so? Subterfuge?
ac
crontab -e;
/dev/null http://mywebserver.com/iamhere.html :wq
1 * * * * wget -q -O
That's it. If my laptop is stolen, I can review my logs on the webserver to see if my laptop has been online. (it'll access http://mywebserver.com/iamhere.html every hour)
I have no problem with your religion until you decide it's reason to deprive others of the truth.
I only use MIL STD 810 laptops. Currently, still using a Panasonic CF-27. I use Linux on the laptop.
Points in favour:
1 - Somewhat of a defensive shield against small arms fire.
2 - Good offensive weapon (hit or throw at attacker -- they probably won't EXPECT you to ever do that with your LAPTOP). If you do score a hit, great, otherwise, take the added opportunity to run.
3 - Encrypted file system. Key for file system (sensitive material) held on external storage, with access passphrase.
4 - Built like a tank, so it just won't die.
5 - "Protective case" is a waste of effort.
Points against:
1 - Slow
2 - Not enough RAM
3 - Small hard disk
4 - Build like a tank, so it just won't die (never get to replace it, unless it is actually stolen)
5 - Confuses some TSA people -- they wonder why it can't be X-rayed!
7 - Weighs around 2.5 kilos.
I don't use a "phone home" system -- the hardware is either insured, or worthless (depending on age, my CF-27 is rapidly approaching "worthless"). The data is encrypted with AES encryption so I am not worried.
YMMV, or course.
Just another "Cubible(sic) Joe" 2 17 3061
Tell the cop the laptop contains donut recipes. Then when the cop gets the laptop and doesn't find the recipes, tell him the thief most have deleted them. It's a win win.
Most BIOS setups let you give the hard drive a password, so that someone can't open it - or format it - even if they remove it from that computer and put it in another. BIOS passwords help, too.
Mmmm...chocolate iced donut...*drool*
"When information is power, privacy is freedom" - Jah-Wren Ryel
Stick a paper/sticky with your name and contact info, and the serial# of the device, secret this inside the machine in a likely area that a tech would see (thieves are rarely techs). Make sure you offer a reward and cover all costs for the return of this stolen property, and insist that this note would be removed if the sale was legitimate. You might get lucky, and the kicker is you usually can track back the thief.
I recommend getting a Panasonic Toughbook with GPS. Besides the obvious anti-theft consideration, it can be useful for other GPS utilities, and many come with cell-phone Internet adapters built in. Also keep in mind that the biggest loss in laptops comes from them breaking themselves. crushed screens, split power connectors, dead motherboards, and getting run over with a car often end up sending laptops to the dump. besides, many come with nifty extras, like automatic backlit keyboard, touchscreens, and more cool toys. for the price of a laptop and a half, you can have a laptop that will outlive three or four normal laptops...
It seems to me like the software tracking systems are pretty useless. If they rely on the computer logging onto the internet, then it probably won't help you unless they can steal your OS login password as well, assuming you're using a password. I do believe they offer Lojack for laptops and there might even be more than one vendor with a hardware tracking system; I'd be surprised if there's not. Hardware is a lot harder to modify than software especially when it comes to laptops.
Could someone point out something to track down stolen cell phones? I suppose it should be a hell of a lot easier than finding laptops. And please don't tell me that the phone company can do it for you, the only time they care is if someone's kidnapped along with it.
Preferably something that works on non-symbian phones also.
After losing two awesome phones I'm using the low tech method of buying such a crappy phone that no one in their right mind would steal it.
Chances are, someone dumb enough to mug you won't be intelligent enough to boot it up in Linux, or connect to the internet. I would use the Windows service.
:(){
Lock your laptop on your body by securing a Kensington lock all around you.
P.S. Or in Italy, as the case may be, Beretta.
P.P.S. Or Glock in Switzerland.
P.P.P.S. Or in Germany, Heckler and Koch. Mmmmmm, H&K...
P.P.P.P.S. Or Glock in Austria.
P.P.P.P.P.S. Glock again in Russia. Screw that Makarov shit.
Talk about happenstance!
In the early 90's I lived in Cambridge, MA with a buddy of mine, and one night we came back to our little apartment to discover his car is gone. Just happens he used to do a little gofering for a prominent Irish fella when he was in high school. So my friend makes a phone call to his old boss and we're instructed to go for a long walk. When we get back an hour later there's his car - sans steering column cover. I am still in awe to this day.
True story, I shit you not.
Sometimes it's good to have a friend in low places.
-- thinkyhead software and media
A company I worked for had the staff's kids fingerpaint the lids of their laptops, thus reducing their potential sell price.
Sure, a cron job is fine ... if you're a geek.
I carry my laptop in one hand, and my katana in the other. I've never had a laptop stolen.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
I don't need a tracking system because I don't carry my laptop around with me everywhere. When I do carry it on travel, it's in a backpack that doesn't look like a laptop bag.
Has anyone ever been caught due to tracking software on a stolen laptop?
Most thieves will just sell the laptop on to some innocent buyer without even powering it on... And slightly smarter thieves will format the machine first, completely removing the tracking software.
Only the legit user will keep the tracking software running, making *them* trackable.
And if tracking software like this becomes common, then _all_ thieves will format the machines as soon as they receive them, and the process of formatting will become just another part of the theft process.
So really, don't waste your money on tracking software... Instead, get the laptop insured against theft, and make sure your important data is encrypted and backed up regularly. If your lucky, the insurance will replace it with a newer model. If you really want to track your laptop, go for a hardware solution, that way it will kick in as soon as its powered on regardless of what/ifany software is running.
http://spamdecoy.net - free throwaway anonymous email - avoid spam!
There's a really good Mac Solution - Undercover. Check their Recovery Case Studies.
You should only need to remove "splash" once if you do it from the "# defoptions" line in menu.lst!
Leaving "quiet" in the options seems to actually help the passphrase prompt, so I leave it in.
Whoo. Gunpoint, eh? Nasty.
Anyhow, I know the feeling. As the adrenaline wears off, the self-righteousness kicks in, and you want to get even. Gosh, this must be how Replublicans must feel all the time, wow! And then, all these dull slashdotters say you can get another one off the insurance, and serves you right for not blacking up your data, and so on, boo hiss. The only practical suggestion involved Linus Torvalds' laptop, and I am not sure how practical that actually was.
Though the police may not find it economic to to much about an isolated theft, it ought to be possible for a specialist company to make a profit out of snitting missing machines on the web. We are not trying to outwit the Master Brain, just the sort of person who can't keep their hands of other peoples shiny things. A lot of the tracing could be done without leaving the office, so you don't have to be Robocop. If they worked on a 'no trace no fee' basis then it would be hard to see how they could rip people off, unlike some of the 'security' services mentioned in the other post that needed you to register upfront. The RIAA spends it's time hunting down data that has no recovery value whatever, and they turn in a profit.
I am no big fan of capitalism, but this is the sort of thig it ought to be best at.
If your friend was THAT determined to break the law he should have went the whole nine yards - but the right (and fun) way.
Pulling a gun on someone - what's that? Assault with a deadly weapon? Maybe even attempted murder if he was stupid enough to say those three little words.
"I'll", "kill" and "you".
Instead, after seeing where his girlfriend lives, just go after him to his house. See where HE lives. Then... you have many options.
A) Break into his house, steal back your laptop if it is still there, steal anything of value, trash the place, get some rabid dogs and let them into his place... be creative. (Remember to hide YOUR identity - mask, gloves etc.)
B) Break into his house, beat the shit out of the fucker with a baseball bat or lead pipe (low tech rules), take back your laptop/belongings and any cash the guy has in the house.
C) In the case he has already passed the laptop/belongings on - see the first part of B. After working on the guy with a bat/pipe ask for your laptop/belongings, give him a P.O. Box address to mail it to and promise to be back if you don't get your stuff back in a week. Or if you see someone staking out that P.O. Box.
For an added bonus - inject the guy with a syringe of pure water (some flu virus would be GREAT if you can get your hands on some) and tell him its a poison/virus that will kill him in 10 days and that he will get the antidote AFTER you get your laptop back.
Don't go to pick up the laptop yourself. Find a homeless guy to do it for you. Or just give him a preaddressed box to another P.O. Box to mail it for you.
If you want to be vigilante it is always good to these four little words: "What would Batman do?".
Pull a gun on someone? Nooou...
Beat the shit out of and fear into someone? Hell yes!
Mit der Dummheit kämpfen Götter selbst vergebens
I'll put the humour back in posthumous!
Ben Hocking
Need a professional organizer?
sorry, but what's the point of writing a new acronym and then spelling it out? Isn't the point of an acronym to reduce the post? Or are you trying to make it a standard.. I mean AYTTMIAS? :-)
I manage a Helpdesk at a Midwestern University. We have a program where we checkout laptop computers to students for their use on a week-by-week basis. We buy Dell equipmen, and that equipment has Computrace LoJack for Laptops by Absolute Software Corporation installed. We had one of our laptops stolen from a student about a year ago. Knowing the chances for recovery were probably very low, we 'wrote it off.' Much to our surprise, the laptop was returned to us yesterday by the student from which it had been stolen! It had been returned to the student by the local police, who recovered it during one of their investigations. From the Absolute folks: "We had a call from a fine citizen that responded to a pop up that we had installed on this stolen computer, your Dell 510." So, in this case, it worked!! I don't know if Absolute has Computrace for Linux or not, but at this point I would certainly recommend this company and its product.
IBM thinkpads offer a baseboard security chip. I have a ThinkPad X60s and you need a finger print to boot it. The baseboard module is tied to the bios and you have to replace the baseboard module and re-flash the bios if you lose the fingerprint or password. No amount of pulling the internal battery will help. To get a new baseboard module you have to have proof of ownership. So get a laptop with built-in security chip and pay for insurance against theft. The security chip also offers hardware level encryption for files and even the entire hard drive if you choose that option. Even if the theifs had access to baseboard modules without proof of ownership they would still have to shell out a hundred bucks or so and that's usually more than a stolen laptop is worth to them in the first place.
A high caliber pistol would probably prevent the need for this.
Get up!
I feel that software-based trackers are not a viable solution. If the thief is computer-competant or knows someone who is, it'd be quite easy for them to just wipe the drive and go from there and BIOS passwords are easily worked around by removing the CMOS battery. I think the only REAL fool proof solution is either a) on-board (so that it can't be removed by thieves) GPS hardware with unique hard-coded 'addresses'. or b) don't buy a laptop - they're a pain in the ass anyways.
Yes, I see what you mean....
Dumb criminal caught by writing his name on the wall
As one detective once commented - "Every dumb criminal is a failure of the education system".
Vintage computer adverts: http://www.vintageadbrowser.com/computers-and-software-ads
That's exactly my experience too. I used to work for a guy who sold new and used computers (on consignment, mostly). Right after Xmas, he had a guy come in with a brand new Toshiba notebook. The guy claimed he got it as an Xmas gift, but really needed the money more than another computer - so he wanted to see if the store would pay him cash for it. The store owner looked it over, offered him $600 or so for it (after photocopying his drivers license), and the deal was made.
... Wasn't worth the potential risk if the guy was armed or something.) He ended up just making an insurance claim for everything, and getting a new copy of his driver's license, etc. etc. REALLY frustrating though, he knew so much about the thief, he could have showed up at the guy's girlfriend's house and waited for him ... yet the cops didn't bother, having all this info spoon-fed to them.
Well, a week or so goes by, and all of a sudden, the county sheriff is in the store, looking for said notebook computer. It turns out the seller was a guy recently released from prison who went on a crime spree, buying a new car, new furniture for his home, etc. -- all with false identities obtained from a buddy who handled credit reports for a pager store. The notebook, too, was purchased this way on one of those retail store credit cards he obtained using false info.
The cops were really pleased that my boss actually had the foresight to photocopy the guy's license, because that was apparently the *only* correct info anyone had on him -- and finally allowed them to pin the crimes to him. Nonetheless, they confiscated the laptop and my boss was out the $600 he paid for it, never to be compensated. (If he knew his "reward" for helping stop a criminal was to lose $600, I imagine he would have been far less co-operative!)
Another good friend of mine had his truck broken into, right in front of my house, one evening. They took his new cellphone, pulled his $800 Alpine car stereo/MP3 changer, and got his wallet he had left under his seat. He was able to log in to his cellphone carrier's web site and get a detailed list of calls, and discovered the thief was actually *using* his cellphone to call his girlfriend and other friends regularly! He reported everything to the police, including keeping them up-to-date on the list of calls being made. STILL, the cops did NOTHING. Made NO attempt to track this guy down at all! After a week or so of this nonsense, my friend ended up calling his cellphone and talked to the thief directly. The thief wanted to work out some kind of trade deal, where he'd give back the wallet and everything in it plus the cellphone, for a couple hundred bucks, at a Denny's restaurant! (He considered his options there, and finally decided to just stand the guy up
Set up your box so the default boot is linux *NOT* windows.
Make sure it by default actively seeks out a wired and/or wireless Internet connection.
Install a crontask that runs every minute, that does nothing more than access a particular website that either you or this tracking company controls and have access to the logs of. Perhaps have it access something like http://thewebsite.com/
saudadelinuxs-laptop-calling-home/ (which may 404, but who cares, the IP its coming from will be logged identifiably).
There, the entire software part of the 'tracker' is done. No proprietary pay-for software needed. The part that might be worth paying for is their assistance in working with law enforcement and ISP's in tracking does where your laptop is based on the IP its connecting from.
Don't cry "Oust Bush," cry "Restore Freedom!" Don't support a candidate who isn't doing anything to unravel Bush's web.
Haven't you read the whole slab of comments above saying precisely that?
That guy should have gone through the cops first, given them the info they needed, and when they start not giving a damn, he should have dropped some hints (nothing explicit) about doing something like that (but don't do it). You'll never see cops move so fast as when they think the *victim* might be tired of being a victim.
You'd think that vigilantism was far worse than crime itself, the way some people talk...
This guy wrote about Lojack for Laptops a while back, and talks about stealing laptops. One thing not mentioned in the article is how this "call home" software deals with highly restrictive firewalls, e.g., if you use it legitimately behind such protection, how does it call home in the first place? Anyway, the article highlights some of the limitations of software-based asset recovery products, namely that they can be defeated by simply paving over the original OS.
I would wholeheartedly recommend LoJack for Laptops from Absolute Software. It's proven to get stolen laptops back and a bargain at only $50 a year. You can't tell its installed and if the computer is lost or stolen they get it back through law enforcement. A very cool product. Alot of computer manufacturers are including it in the BIOS.
don't complain when someone needs a few hundred bucks, more than you need a PORTABLE INTERNET COMMUNICATIONS DEVICE!!!!!
.... OR the guy with the *laptop* or *PDA*????
He was held up AT GUNPOINT! This wasn't a "broke the car window and swiped a laptop" type of crime, this was someone brandishing an instrument of death. Yes, sir, I want that person locked up until such time(if any) as they can be rehabilitated.
Wait a minute... Who needs rehabilitation? The guy with the gun?
I have had some experience with LoJack for Laptops. My friend had Dell install this tracing software right when he purchased his computer. About 3 weeks later he had a party and woke up to find his brand new laptop missing. Long story short, about a week later LoJack worked hand in hand with the police and found his laptop at another college campus an hour away. He was able to press charges if he wanted. A laptop is stolen every 53 seconds3 from coffee shops, college campuses, hotel rooms and motor vehicles. Losing your computer is costly, even devastating when you consider the priceless photos, files and personal information you have stored on your computer. LoJackforlaptops.com for more info. I'd highly recommend this service!