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Canadian Police Identify Suspect From Remotely-Accessed Stolen Laptop (cochraneeagle.com)
An anonymous reader writes:
Last week a security consultant remotely logged into his stolen laptop, and gathered clues from a Facebook profile. Though it didn't provide the suspect's real name, the consultant shared the profile online, and says he's now receiving tips from other crime victims who are scouring through the profile's friends list. And according to a local newspaper, the Canadian police say they've now identified a suspect, although "there is a lot of work that needs to be done before we can lay charges."
But despite this apparent victory, one officer is also warning the public against sharing a suspect's identity on social media, according to the paper, "after the social media post may have wrongly identified a suspect."
"When you get to public shaming, I urge caution..." the police officer tells the newspaper. "As a person that gets stuff stolen, I understand the want to publicly shame someone... Give us all the info, and we will follow up once we have the evidence."
But despite this apparent victory, one officer is also warning the public against sharing a suspect's identity on social media, according to the paper, "after the social media post may have wrongly identified a suspect."
"When you get to public shaming, I urge caution..." the police officer tells the newspaper. "As a person that gets stuff stolen, I understand the want to publicly shame someone... Give us all the info, and we will follow up once we have the evidence."
If you have access to it and can know who has it and where it is you can probably get an officer to come with you and knock on a door. If the person denies having it just have it starting making noise or play a loud audio clip about it being stolen. At that point the police officer has probable cause and could enter the dwelling.
No need to post stuff to social media or anything like that. Hell once a cop is at the door it's pretty easy to talk the person into admitting that they must have "found" it and that you're so greatful that they've kept it safe until you could pick it up. Give people an easy out and they'll usually take it.
Person who has the laptop now may not be the person who stole it, and may have no idea that is was. Lots of used laptops on craigslist,
A job for Maple Man and Syrup Boy !
You could have incontrovertible evidence of the identity of the thief or the current possessor of the laptop, but it's extremely unlikely that you'll be able to find a police department that's sufficiently interested to bother helping unless it's part of a larger crime. I'm not saying the police are bad people, but I am saying that most departments appear to be under-resourced to follow-up on petty crime.
A "security consultant" with only *one* monitor? No. He's a poser and deserves to lose his laptop. I pity the thief who had to deal with cheetos dust in the keyboard.
If I stole a laptop I would wipe it and reinstall the OS. It amazes me a thief wouldn't do this immediately after acquiring the device.
If you're poor, you can go to BestBuy and buy a clean, never used PC laptop for $200. You can get a Chrome Book for even cheaper than that. There is simply no reason to buy a used computer except from someone you know and trust because you can find literally almost anything, brand new, at a good price point.
But but old hardware? How about you just recycle it?The alternative is that you give it to someone, it breaks not much later and ends up in a landfill instead of at least probably getting shredded and its materials repurposed.
Don't hold your breath.
After all, the police have to man a shitload of speed traps in order to shakedown the public for even more money, errr, keep the highways safe.
Generally, receiving stolen property is a crime only if you know it's stolen (or work hard to avoid knowing). Here's the actual text of the statute in Texas, for example:
Sec. 31.03. THEFT. (a) A person commits an offense if he unlawfully appropriates property with intent to deprive the owner of property.
(b) Appropriation of property is unlawful if:
(1) it is without the owner's effective consent;
(2) the property is stolen and the actor appropriates the property knowing it was stolen by another;
Later in the statute it sets out specific rules for pawn shops. The special rules are just for pawn shops, not Craigslist buyers. Pawn shops must get ID and have the seller sign a form declaring that it isn't stolen. If the pawn shop fails to get the paperwork, it is presumed that the shop knows the item is probably stolen. (That's just a presumption, the shop can argue why they thought it was not stolen - "Your honor, the hair dryer is permanently labeled "'property of Floyd's Barbershop'. We bought it from Floyd, who of course does legitimately own hair dryers, so we reasonably believed it was actually Floyd's hair dryer."
Am I missing something, if I was to ever steal a laptop, first thing would be to re-image...
Unless there is something in the boot/bios that lets you track your laptop even after a re-image, furthermore, let you login, this strategy won't really work. Cellphones have IMEI but as far as I know, laptops, at least the ones without a cellular chips do not have any such unique identifiers. Well may be a mac-address, but there is no way to track down based on the mac-address!
I guess all those people who voted for vigilante justice because the police *never* do anything can eat some humble pie.
What if someone bought a laptop used? Someone offered a laptop on EBay, someone else bought it and suddenly you have a probably quite honest person who just bought a used laptop that you start to mess with, ruin his credit rating and possibly his life.
Be careful with vigilante action. I have zero problem if you hit the right person, but ... well, hitting the right person isn't that easy.
But the lesson to learn here is that you ALWAYS wipe a laptop you buy used. ALWAYS. Even if it looks wiped, wipe it.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
"Studebaker Hoch, yeah yeah, Studebaker Hoch Studebaker Hoch ...he's coating his legs with Aunt Jemima Syrup up and down, his shorts will be filled with flies that will be buzzing all around......"
Anyone know . or guess the source? I know you know.
I admire the extra miles that the CRP go to help theft victims... Unlike the irresponsible cops that we got in the US...
Recently my car was broken into, an iPhone stolen. I tracked it to tthe very location it was held and I called police but they took hours to call back only to tell me that I have to be at the iPhone location or they won't help. Well guess what? It took me 90 minutes to get through the first phone call to begin with.
Through another attempt, I got the police to meet me outside the house that had my phone. They told me that if the person holding the phone doesn't want to give it back, I have to turn around and walk away because the crime is not severe enough for them to declare that person under arrest. Since when breaking into a car no longer an important crime?
Surprised about the body, not so much about the theft. I've had my house broken into twice. I've had the police show up both times and basically take notes, but it does seem more of a routine for insurance than any real hope catching anyone. Heck TV shows have been making fun of that fact for decades (Friends, Seinfeld, etc...). The second time they made a show of doing CSI stuff like finger printing... but I doubt 95% of the time it is ever used for anything except to put it on file. BTW that finger printing stuff is a bitch to get off of everything...
The only time I ever heard back from police was for a crime I didn't bother reporting. I had my gym locker broken into and my wallet stolen. I only had 40-60$ in it so while it sucked wasn't a big deal. It was a bigger pain in the ass to cancel and replace all the cards and ID that was in it that probably got thrown away. However randomly I got a call from police in a different city, where the dummy got caught trying to cash a check I had in my wallet (it had my name, address, etc... on it) that he filled out and the bank informed the cops. We had a chat and I told him the history (apparently this guys MO was to travel around a city hitting all the gyms before returning home). Anyway the only end result was I got them to destroy the check. Didn't get anything back. However I got a little satisfaction that it was my check that busted the guy.
They told me that if the person holding the phone doesn't want to give it back, I have to turn around and walk away because the crime is not severe enough for them to declare that person under arrest. Since when breaking into a car no longer an important crime?
And at the same time, police in some jurisdictions will literally destroy a house chasing a shop-lifter:
https://www.google.ca/search?q=house+destroyed+shoplifter&oq=house+destroyed+shoplifter&aqs=chrome..69i57.6664j0j7&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8
It is the end-times.