Slashdot Mirror
Ask Slashdot: Protecting Tech Gear From Smash-and-Grab Theft?
rstory writes "I seem to be hearing about more smash and grab thefts lately, from low-tech purse snatching to thieves after laptops and cameras. Bold thieves are even snatching stuff in church/day-care parking lots in the 5 minute window while a parent goes in to pick up their child. I often drive around with my laptop, and want to find the best way to protect against theft. Besides the obvious 'don't leave equipment in the car' solution, what else are people doing? Right now I just use a regular backpack instead of a fancy laptop case. I don't have a trunk, so when I leave the car I put the backpack on the floor of the back seat, sometimes throwing other junk on top. The only interesting thing I've found while googling is a couple of 'anti-theft' backpacks which have wire mesh to prevent cutting them open and a (thin looking) cable for securing to a stationary object. What do you do to protect your gear?"
If I park somewhere that has a reasonable chance of a smash-and-grab, I take valuables with me.
Period.
Who cares if it's locked down to something, if it looks like there is something valuable in the car, it's going to get broken in to. And if they can't take the thing they really want, they'll likely do extra damage, just because.
Other than that, I try to avoid leaving my car in locations that I worry about its safety.
Another non-functioning site was "uncertainty.microsoft.com."
The purpose of that site was not known.
Get a dog and keep it in the car.
It's an old photographer's trick to keep gear in a diaper bag. Nobody wants to go near that (literal) shit.
They don't grade fathers, but if your daughter's a stripper, you fucked up. --Chris Rock
What happens when the perp wipes the hard drive? Barring some BIOS magic, your software just disappears. That's the first thing I do when I steal laptops.
If I'm going around with my laptop, I put it in the inconspicuous place in my car *before* I get in my car. Not after I've stopped and everyone nearby can see that I'm hiding something valuable.
t
The location can be tracked as soon as your OS loads, you can wipe a laptop without ever loading the OS
Well, the location can be tracked from the second it laptop is turned on and since wiping a laptop isn't instantaneous it gives you a (very) small window to track the culprit.
How does it do this with no Internet and booting from a system recovery disk? It is only helpful to catch the stupid criminals. Admittedly, that is most of them.
But it does nothing for the real problem. You now need a new window and backpack. The only good solution is to avoid the smash...
I work for a Major Bank and we have BiOS "Magic" that will track the Wi-Fi Card MAC, HDD MAC and MB MAC regardless of how many times the HDD is wiped. We have made it so it would be more expensive to replace all of those parts than it would be buy a new laptop. It works as we have laptops stolen all the time and find them with the help of local law enforcement.
The Caveat is that it has to be on a the internet for us to track it. So if someone wants it to just be a local word processor to print to a local printer we will never know about it.
"I think you know what I'm talkin' about, Mr. President; We're gonna kill us a mummy!" - Bruce Campbell as Elvis Presley
Surprised nobody else has said it, but it also helps if you have a piece-of-junk car. People don't expect to find anything worth stealing if you have visible rust and dents on a 10-year-old Ford or Saturn. I've never had a car broken into, and I frequently leave (small amounts of) cash in plain sight and a backpack with a laptop in the back seat.
Slightly more low-tech, but giving the same idea of 'make it trackable' is Stuffbak. It's just a (hard to remove) sticker, but it means you can prove a specific device is yours.
But none of this is prevention. If you can't hide it and you can't lock it, take it with you.
'Sensible' is a curse word.
I'm waiting to see someone combine these remote tracking and accessibility methods with semtex and finishing nails packed in the old optical drive bay.
As a fun bonus, your vacations just became a lot more interesting.
What happens when the perp wipes the hard drive? Barring some BIOS magic, your software just disappears
LoJack for Laptops has code in the firmware of all of the major laptop manufacturers. The code is dormant, but wakes up when you install the product. Once activated, the code checks for the presence of the LoJack agent on the hard drive and replaces it if it's removed or if it's been tampered with. It will survived an OS re-install, hard drive wipe - Even a hard drive swap.
My work laptop drive is encrypted. We consider the data far more valuable than the hardware, and they can have it.
My personal tablet notebook has the TPC engaged, and without the drive (which is unique and expensive) it's worthless. If I'm at all competent as a thief, I know this and avoid that model and those similar. The meth heads aren't, so I would probably check CL and find it for sale in a day or so. Ring ring.
In fact, my work notebook, when it is replaced, is essentially scrap. We have to shred the drives, rendering the rest of it worth zilch. Kinda sad.
Personally, I would bolt an eye to a seat, use a Kensington cable, and if it is really that bad thread the cable through the bag onto the notebook. This is mostly to slow down a thief, and leave you with a broken window instead. First step is to camo the bag, either slipping it under a seat or behind something innocuous. In the convertible you can hardly see my bag. In the Explorer, slipping it under a rear seat makes it virtually invisible also. Anyone who sees me do that of course knows the trick, but that's an even smaller window of opportunity. A decent car alarm will help some, but your window is busted anyways. LoJack for laptops sounds good until you find out it's in India.
deleting the extra space after periods so i can stay relevant, yeah.
Go too Goodwill, grab a ratty looking Barney the Dinosaur. Cut a hole and insert.
Wait, are we still talking about theft?
In your case, what would happen is the perp would break into your car to grab the fake laptop, discover it's a fake laptop, and then he'd notice the black cloth and you would be out the real laptop. :)
Jason
And probably a couple more windows because you just pissed him off.
I had my car broken into once, had my girlfriend's purse stolen and my new speakers stolen. They couldn't get the radio out so they just smashed it and much of the dash.
Best way to save your stuff is to not be a target. Don't give them a reason to even consider that there is something in the car. Keep everything clean, and dont make it look like you're hiding anything. My friend had his window smashed out for a pack of cigarettes once.
I didn't do anything because this was a very tall bloke, and was probably carrying a knife. I didn't call the police either, since, this being East London, he was no doubt part of a gang and knowing my luck I'd walk into him the following week.
I'm admittedly unfamiliar with London and it's culture but this irks the hell out of me. Maybe it's just the way of life there but here's a relevant movie quote:
"And I am reminded, on this holy day, of the sad story of Kitty Genovese. As you all may remember, a long time ago, almost thirty years ago, this poor soul cried out for help time and time again, but no person answered her calls. Though many saw, no one so much as called the police. They all just watched as Kitty was being stabbed to death in broad daylight. They watched as her assailant walked away. Now, we must all fear evil men. But there is another kind of evil which we must fear most, and that is the indifference of good men."
You don't need to bend the law for a former professional to be useful. You just need to know how to report an issue so it becomes a priority. Also, they know what you need to give to the cops to make it easy enough for them to go take care of it with little hassle. If the ex-cops know how to make life easier on already overworked cops, it is much more likely that the cops will work your case in preference to another one.
On the other hand, they also know procedure and the law so that the cops they work with can't try and brush you off with an excuse or some paperwork. If a cop is lazy, the ex-cop will know to perhaps ask for a sergeant and then quote some line and verse at them which is technically available for any citizen to use, but only cops know that it is there and how to invoke it.
Finally, they realize that a company that handles dozens of these a day may well be one that they have to take seriously. As an individual, you're powerless against the police machinery, but a company with lawyers on retainer, ex-cops, and PR people are much more of a force to be reckoned with.
It's all about bureaucracy and how to navigate it. Technically it's nothing that you couldn't do yourself, but you wouldn't even know where to start.