Stolen Laptops

Silver Bullet

Recently, this week actually, my sisters house was broken into and robbed. The thief got off with very few items but one of them was her laptop. She is working on finishing up her degree and had several papers that she has/had saved to the local hard drive with no backup plan at all. So, there goes her laptop and long hard work.

Now, I know that there is software out there that you can install on your hard drive that will contact some third party and in the event that your laptop is stolen then they will provide you with all the connection information for your stolen laptop. Right?

Well that is all fine and good but if that person that stole the laptop has any knowledge whatsoever about computers, then he/she will just format and reinstall an OS. Now your chances of recovering your laptop with your "LAPTOP LOCATER SOFTWARE" are gone with the wind.

Here is what I'm thinking.
I think that the BIOS makers need to add an option to enter "contact home" information. The required information in this option should be a server to contact for a specified period time once a connection has been established on any interface. The information sent should be like the serial number of the laptop, which some BIOS makers already include an entry for in their BIOS's

Now there would still need to be a "Home" server for the laptop to contact. I think for most companies it would be feasible to setup there own server with some old hardware out of the closet. As far as the software to run.......maybe some implementation of SNORT??? This server would not need to be in service at all times just when you needed to find a rogue or stolen PC/Laptop.

As far as the home user is concerned, surely there is a market out there for someone to run a contact server full time.

Of course you would want to Password protect the BIOS. You still have the chance of the thief resetting the BIOS to remove the password but I feel the chances of that are lower than a reformatting of the hard drive.

Anyone have any other ideas for this type of situation

deneb829

I think the department of homeland security would agree with you on laptop tracking.

amyamandaallen

Slightly different tacked

It aint neet and it aint stylish

BUT borrow/buy an engraver from somewhere and mark it with your home postcode ( or equivilent ), somewhere where its very obvious.

It may not look great BUT anyone stealing it will probably not bother. It cant be sold unless its for next to nothing as anyone who buys it can see its been engraved! Good chance of the police getting it back to you too and makes wonderfull evidence if fingerprints are all over it.

Also the theif mates/family know thats not his postcode marked on it so gets a few more odd looks shall we say. Cant flog it in the paper or on the net cause again a buyer could simple look up the postcode and see its not the sellers address.

As I said it aint great to look at but really does work. ( ps works for car CD players too )

Our works engraved everywhere!

Webmaster

Recently, this week actually, my sisters house was broken into and robbed. The thief got off with very few items but one of them was her laptop. She is working on finishing up her degree and had several papers that she has/had saved to the local hard drive with no backup plan at all. So, there goes her laptop and long hard work.

Sorry to hear about that, that really sucks.

Anyone have any other ideas for this type of situation

Backups (and EFS). I work mostly on a notebook, and I really need to get me a DVD writer for it. My insurance would pay for a new notebook, but without a decent backup, I would lose months of work (like half-finished TechNotes, practice exams, and other things I'm working). I now copy all my data to a desktop with a DVDwriter but I also copy most of it to an SD card, and store copies at an external location. If a thief would steal my notebook, I need to be sure he doesn't take the backups as well. Plus my house could burn down or whatever.

The point is that everyone (including students) should create decent backups regularly as well as have a good restore (distaster recovery) method. The data is often a lot harder to 'replace' than the hardware.

Your suggestion sounds a bit like something they do with cellphones here. If it's registered stolen, the police can send text messages to the phone (not to the phone number, which is irrelevant), frequently, so a thief would have a hard-time selling it. Far from hack-proof, but it helps.

I'm not sure how hack-proof this is, but besides the engraving as suggested by the previous poster, some notebooks can be digitally tagged in the bios, which they could prevent from being changed without the help of the manufacturer. Not sure if it would do the popularity of the product much good, though used ones may sell better...

strauchr

Backups bakups backups. Can't be stressed enough.

Alot of things can go wrong with a computer and you need to be prepared for it, especially uni papers etc.

Just buy a simple 1gb memory stick which should be enough for your documentation, maybe even need a smaller one. They are 4gb+ now so much more worthwhile than a DVD writer.

But it does suck to have anything stolen. Write you serial numbers down so if it ever shows up it can be traced. But to be honest once some dirty criminal has got their hands on your stuff would you really want it back?

KGhaleon

I know there are places where you can report a stolen laptop if you know the make, model, etc. I work on a lot of laptops at work and I'm always concerned about someone bringing in a stolen laptop(though it's not likely)...since there's not much you can do. Maybe we'll all have GPS locators in our laptops one day?

KG

NetworkGod

but.. but.. i like stolen laptops! they're cheap and shiny! jk

steve-o87

Silver Bullet wrote:

Anyone have any other ideas for this type of situation

Chop their hands off!!

Silver Bullet wrote:

Here is what I'm thinking.
I think that the BIOS makers need to add an option to enter "contact home" information. The required information in this option should be a server to contact for a specified period time once a connection has been established on any interface. The information sent should be like the serial number of the laptop, which some BIOS makers already include an entry for in their BIOS's

Now there would still need to be a "Home" server for the laptop to contact. I think for most companies it would be feasible to setup there own server with some old hardware out of the closet. As far as the software to run.......maybe some implementation of SNORT??? This server would not need to be in service at all times just when you needed to find a rogue or stolen PC/Laptop.

As far as the home user is concerned, surely there is a market out there for someone to run a contact server full time.

Of course you would want to Password protect the BIOS. You still have the chance of the thief resetting the BIOS to remove the password but I feel the chances of that are lower than a reformatting of the hard drive.

I think their will definitely be a market for that kind of thing in the future. With the help of IPv6 we will have the resources available to make it possible, I think. If everything had a globally unique ip address, this kind of tracking would be real easy.

Just my 2c

sprkymrk

I wouldn't spread the idea of a bios being able to phone home. That's what I would call "deeply imbedded spyware". Sure, the honest OEM's (is there really any such thing) will make it "opt in", but others wil just put it in without telling you. They can actually do this with the firmware on other things like video cards and broadband routers. Remember the big stink about that some time ago? There was also a tech-fiction book written on the subject of a foreign company placing this kind of software on their budget-priced video cards in order to secretly download updates that.... I won't give it away, but it was a scheme to influence an election. The book:
http://www.amazon.com/Mezonic-Agenda-Hacking-Presidency/dp/1931836833/sr=1-1/qid=1161363368/ref=sr_1_1/002-6519567-6815203?ie=UTF8&s=books

Silver Bullet

Yeah... I think she is more aware of the importance of backups now than before. And she would rather have the data from the laptop back than the laptop itself. She has already replaced the laptop and got a desktop at the same time(As well as a Home Security System), but her papers are gone for good I'm afraid.

I was more or less looking for a way to track stolen computers for individuals and companies alike, to find and prosecute the criminals.

I agree that the idea I posted could be abused, but computers are being abused on a daily basis now with spyware and viruses.

Plantwiz

There was a device for portables on the news the other morning only I don't recall if I was watching ABC or NBC

I'll continue to look.

There are some nifty things
http://www.thinkgeek.com/gadgets/security/

and
http://www.cyberguys.com/templates/searchproducts.asp?categoryID=22

maby not practical, but could be fun

****

Sorry to hear of your sister's bad luck That stinks that notebooks are still being stolen. Seems like everyone already has one.

endersftd

Also, didn't the Pentium III processor have a feature to broadcast it's unique identification number? Theoretically, two laptops would not have the same number. This feature was later turned off on manufactured PCs and I don't even think it's available on the P4. The BIOS tracking thing you were talking about made me think of this.