Slashdot Mirror
"Back To My Mac" Catches a Thief
robipilot writes "Mac stolen, Mac comes online, owner connects using 'Back to My Mac,' owner takes picture of culprit, and voila, criminal caught. OK, it wasn't quite that simple, but here's an interesting story of using some built-in technology on the Mac to recover a stolen laptop."
Thousands of peepholes for the guys in Cupertino to look through...
What?
I'm curious to know how would taking a picture of a musical instrument help in this matter...
Yep ! Viola is french for rape. And voilà is written with an accent.
Anyone else a little concerned that this could be used to spy on you if it becomes compromised?
did something like this in 2000. See p. 15 of this 3 MB zipped Powerpoint.
See also P-p-p-Powerbook! for a possible laugh.
#!
I know, this being Slashdot we have to worry about the privacy issues, compare the Mac to somebody's Vista laptop, disparage the cops, fret about security in general, and not fail to point out that a viola is indeed a stringed instrument.
But there's just something so damned satisfying about imagining these two thugs being caught red-handed with the loot. There's the impression of the victim realizing that she may be onto something. Her "Now I've got you, you son of a bitch!" as the fatal snap takes place. The "Oh, shit" realization of the thief, probably followed by frantic thoughts of how he might go about flushing two widescreen TV's and assorted recreational electronics. The genuine gratification of being able to walk into the police station and say, "Here are photographs of the guys who ripped off our stuff, actually using some of our stuff, and we know who they are..." Perhaps then the THUD THUD THUD at the malefactors' door.
It's got all the elements of the classic cautionary tale, and just reading it should bring at least a brief and sarcastic smile to the face of anybody who's ever been robbed.
"Here's what's happening. You're starting to drive like your Dad..." - Red Green
It was nice of those guys to stand in front of her computer and pose for her like they were in mug shots. It's almost like they knew they did something wrong! Oh wait...
i\hbar\dot{\psi}=\hat{H}\psi
a) She lives on Ridgeview Avenue.
b) She's at the edge of the city's downtown.
c) Many of the homes in the area have been renovated recently.
d) She lives in a colonial-style house.
e) The house is diagonally opposite a church.
If that's not enough info: One of the laptops was a Macintosh belonging to Kait Duplaga, who works at the Apple store in the Westchester mall and thus knows how to use all its bells and whistles. Just tail her from where she works.
The only info in this that's actually relevant is the fact that she works at an Apple store, and that's she did not wish to be interviewed. The rest is either a reporter padding an article with irrelevant information, or attempting to indirectly violate her right to privacy.
Either way, very poor journalism.
Don't tell me to get a life. I had one once. It sucked.
the TFA...this acronym redundancy brought to you by the makers of the NIC card and ATM machine.
As our way of thanking you for your positive contributions to Slashdot, you are eligible to disable Slashdot 2.0.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
In the early days of webcams I used to work for this tech company, the bos (a techofile) had just set up a webcam from his computer in the London office to his computer in the New York office. He then flow to New York, a cople of guys and I where working quite late, when I see this other junior guy sat in the boss's chair saying with his legs on the boss's desk imitating the boss's voice "I am the boss and I am gay". When suddenly the computer screen turned on and he saw the boss telling him "YOU ARE FIRED". It was so funny to see this guy's face! (in fairness, the boss was gay ...)
Undercover does this sort of thing. It transmits network information, screenshots, and pictures from Macs with iSights. http://www.orbicule.com/undercover/
*blinking cursor*
The thing is, most people haven't enabled a password to log into their computer or to wake it from sleep mode. It certainly is smart to have a login password, but the vast vast majority don't, and most also don't even realize that you [i]can[/i] have one.
I was thinking about something like this for a while, and this is a practical example, albeit, with different technology.
Did anyone see the movie, with Patrick Stewart, "Safe House?" To make a long story short, he has to enter a password every day to ensure an automated system does not activate. If he ever fails to enter that password, the system assumes he's dead and will let loose damaging blackmail that keeps him alive.
Anyway, a system like that would be very cool for home users. A small "safe house" program that gets run at startup that prompts for a password and gives you a number of tries. If the password is unsuccessful, the camera is activated, and web cam photos are sent to a known server when the network comes up, along with sound as well. Possibly key strokes and new documents web traffic and sites. All this happens quietly, in fact, there is no feedback as to the password being unsuccessful after the second try.
This information, along with the IP address, can be used to identify the thief and recover the property.
I run Ubuntu on my home PCs and changed the default login screen to list the users. I created a 'Guest' account and in it's description I put 'Password = 123qwe' (not the real password). The assumption is that a burglar , not knowing much about OS'es, will want to use the PC and will choose the easiest path to gain access. When they turn the PC on the login screen gives them a list of users and an option of choosing "Guest Account with the Password shown. All household users have been told to *never* use this account and why.
This 'Guest' account is CharRooted and has Firefox, IM and other Internet clients all on the desktop but that's about it. Under the hood it opens up SSH, VNC, Terminal Server and every other conceivable way of gaining access. It starts a script that every 30 minutes emails my Gmail account with IP address and connection information. Also, logging on to this account invokes a 'Nuke' scrip that will DBAN type wipe the system if I don't deactivate it within 7 days.
It's not a perfect solution but it has all the capabilities and features of the subscription tracking services that can cost hundreds a year and it's all pretty easy to setup. If any thief steals my PC and uses it to connect to the Internet I will know everything about their connection and have full access to the machine. If it's truly lost and I can't regain control after they login, it self destructs.
Now that I thinks about it, this should be a Ubuntu package or at least a HowTO.
-[d]-
I probably shouldn't...
The violin wasn't invented until many centuries after the burning of Rome. Nero did play an instrument, a cithra I believe it is called, and did consider himself to be quite a musician. (Oddly I don't recall any mention of his skill level in my studies, just that he was passionate and competed and organized competitions.)
Titicus (spelling?), the historian, was pretty clear in what Nero really did during the burning of Rome. He was much more effective than, say, FEMA. He rushed down, helped to fight the fires, gave shelter, and provided food at either a discounted or free rate. I'm not entirely sure if it was free or discounted and I lack the initiative to look this stuff up.
So, while the idea of a tyrant (which Nero certainly was) ignoring the plights of the people makes for great copy it just didn't happen that way. What did happen is that Nero used this fire to persecute the Christians but that was after the fire when the people were looking for someone to blame.
Anyhow... To the point... Err... Wait, no... I didn't have a point.
"So long and thanks for all the fish."
Not stealing macbooks? How else can we afford them :)
---- Booth was a patriot ----
I've already got my laptop making hourly requests to a non-existent image on a website I control. So if it ever goes walking, I might get an IP address from that. As someone pointed out, I might want to create a guest account, so that the thief would be willing to use the laptop as-is.
But what other sensory information does my laptop have? One thought: Wifi. Even before it connects, it can give you the names of wireless networks nearby. If you could somehow upload that list to a server you control, there is a small chance you might be able to wardrive your way to victory. But command-line wifi utilities seem to be rare. Any ideas?
You want the truthiness? You can't handle the truthiness!
We care because I have it on good authority that women often use their Macs after having just come out of the shower, a good workout, being smeared in grits, rolling in Jell-O, bathing in whipped cream, and/or while do a self-breast exam. That's why we care!
You act like you haven't had your domain sqatted on by Jenny's Personal Co-Ed Webcam Sexperience after missing a payment that one time that it happened to me.
A Mac doesn't have a traditional PC-style BIOS. Instead what it has is called an EFI. EFI stands for Extensible Firmware Interface. This does essentially the same thing as BIOS.
Unless the owner has disabled alternate booting through the EFI, you can change anyone's Mac OS user password by booting with a Mac OS installer DVD and using a standard password utility to change the root password or any user password.
A program called Undercover will transmit pictures using the built-in iSight camera (with the green indicator light disabled - despite what other posters have said, you CAN transmit video and disable the indicator light in software) and also report back the public IP address of the illegitimate user. If the owner has disabled alternate booting through the EFI, this software is very difficult to remove.
Ask Me About... The 80's!
That's because no one knows. No matter how good or how bad he was, he would still be awarded every prize there was.
Titicus (spelling?), the historian,Tacitus, Annals 15.38-44. Accounts are also given by Cassius Dio book 62, and Suetonius' Life of Nero.
He rushed down, helped to fight the fires, gave shelter, and provided food at either a discounted or free rate. I'm not entirely sure if it was free or discounted and I lack the initiative to look this stuff up.Not everyone is as lazy. Tacitus continues after the passage you refer to (15.39), "These acts, though popular, produced no effect, since a rumour had gone forth everywhere that, at the very time when the city was in flames, the emperor appeared on a private stage and sang the Sack of Troy, comparing present misfortunes with the calamities of antiquity." The same story is given by Suetonius and Cassius Dio, who appear to have used different evidence for their accounts, making it all but certain that the story is pretty accurate.
What did happen is that Nero used this fire to persecute the Christians but that was after the fire when the people were looking for someone to blame.Based on the evidence of Tacitus, Cassius Dio, and Suetonius, there is a possibility, albeit slim, that he was entirely accurate in this allocation of blame.
(Too lazy to lower my comment threshold) but if you're interested in setting up Back to My Mac without a .Mac subscription, check our this article.
Bark less. Wag more.