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Stolen Laptop Owner Outwits Mugger, Police, and the Media

Posted by timothy on from the dirty-deeds-dragged-into-view dept.

An anonymous reader writes "What do you get mugged in Central London and the local police are too incompetent to find a mugger even with his address and photograph? You may not be able to get to the laptop, but you still own the photos and data on it, so you set up the NSFW Plumpergeddon blog which gives details of the subsequent 'owner's' 'Brick House Butts' fetishes. Now of course later the IT media might get interested and offer an interview with a promise to let him review the article and keep his name secret. luckily our hero is not so innocent and demonstrates the value of using a false name on the internet as well as planting your own monitoring software on your laptop."

10 of 272 comments (clear)

  1. Speak English, dickless. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Informative

    Based on the content of the summary, I have no fucking idea what this story is about.

    1. Re:Speak English, dickless. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Informative

      Guy got his laptop stolen.

      Police wouldn't pull ATM video or follow-up with the 11 other locations his (also stolen) card were used. This pissed off the victim.

      He hasn't tracked the thief, but his laptop regularly sends photos and screenshots while the laptop is in use. This is old news, from a tech perspective.

      He posts them on a blog. Much of it is the thief masturbating to porn of grossly overweight women, on sites where he used the victims stolen card to buy memberships.

      The thief, unsurprisingly, sucks at life in a number of other ways. He keeps getting banned from eBay. His pathetic dating profile has been posted, etc.

      The Register wrote an article full of incorrect information, because the victim declined to reveal his identity and do a real interview. As such, nobody knows his real info. He can continue to operate the shame site.

      He has not made any real money running the blog, even with the ads. Less than 100 gbp. This summary stinks of an advertisement to build the viewership and ad revenue generation. I suspect as much because the blog operator isn't vury guud wath tha englishes, either.

      I think that covers it.

    2. Re:Speak English, dickless. by Jah-Wren+Ryel · · Score: 3, Informative

      > This summary stinks of an advertisement to build the viewership and ad revenue generation.

      The guy's goal is public shaming, but that doesn't work unless a lot of the public sees the website. So he probably did submit the story here, but it is doubtful that a few banner ads are going to make him any significant amount of money.

      --
      When information is power, privacy is freedom.
  2. What the What? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Informative

    I've read this twice and I'm still confused.

    I'll try to translate what I think the article says:
    1. Man was mugged and lost his laptop.
    2. Police won't do anything about it.
    3. He has hidden software on his old laptop that was sending images and data back to him.
    4. He posted it on the Internet under a fake name
    5. ...
    6. Profit?

  3. Re:Hero..maybe to you. by 93+Escort+Wagon · · Score: 4, Informative

    And I guess the submitter missed the other story that came out of England a few weeks ago where the theft victim similarly posted the "thieves" photos all over, only to discover the people he was harassing were innocent.

    --
    #DeleteChrome
  4. Re:What do you get mugged? by WindowsWasher · · Score: 4, Informative

    This is beyond a 'lost art'. This is shameful. Slashdot has reached a new low.

  5. Re:Hero..maybe to you. by Jah-Wren+Ryel · · Score: 4, Informative

    That might well be, but it's pretty clear that the "victim" in all of this has himself broken the law and is liable at bare minimum for libel, if not various other laws.

    It ain't libel if it is true.

    It's unfortunate the the mugger would get away, but ultimately, the UK has a system of laws and you don't get to break them just because somebody else has broken them first.

    A system of arbitrarily enforced laws is anarchy. The blogger can't get the law enforced in the first place.

    Besides, this isn't about what's legal, its about what's moral. The mugger is sending the blogger those pictures. He made that decision when he stole the laptop. He's probably not cognizant of that decision, but it is a reasonable assumption that using a stolen computer will result in the webcam sending photos to the rightful owner. After all, the guy did put a piece of tape over the camera for the first 4 weeks.

    --
    When information is power, privacy is freedom.
  6. Re:What do you get mugged? by Legion303 · · Score: 4, Informative

    "Slashdot has reached a new low."

    Not really. Just the usual bottom-of-the-barrel standards I've come to expect from this editor.

  7. Re:Tech news by aevan · · Score: 5, Informative

    Luckily, the UK won the War of Independence and no longer have to listen to the prattle of uppity colonists and their opinions on 'legal rights' :P

  8. Re:What do you get mugged? by clarkkent09 · · Score: 3, Informative

    Hmm, I think this is a new low actually. Yes, it's been bad but not this bad.

    --
    Negative moral value of force outweighs the positive value of good intentions.