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General discussion

Is there a way to trace my stolen laptop?

Aug 12, 2016 4:25PM PDT


Help! My MacBook Pro was snatched out of my car 2 weeks ago! I had not activated firmware lock. Is there anyway of tracing it? Find My iPhone was on and I've set it to lost mode. Whether there is a way to trace my stolen laptop or not, is there reliable software/hardware out there that can be installed on/in a laptop (Mac/PC) that in the event that the laptop is stolen, there is a method to trace and possibly reclaim it? All suggestions are welcomed.

--Submitted by Keletso N.

Post was last edited on August 12, 2016 4:47 PM PDT

Discussion is locked

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two weeks ago???
Aug 12, 2016 4:45PM PDT

basically at this point, you are out of luck. without any tracking software there really is nothing you can do.

you might be able to track it through any open accounts that have auto logins but after two weeks, the os may have been re-installed or the harddrive replaced. you can check to see if any of your accounts have been accessed by the laptop since it was stolen and if so, contact the police. do not do any more than that since you could corrupt any info that might be available

Post was last edited on August 19, 2016 5:01 PM PDT

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Installing tacking numbers s/w in case of theft
Aug 21, 2016 7:26PM PDT

Please tell me about installing installing s/w on your computer to track it of some one steals it.

I want to do that

joe dibenedetto

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Prey, firmware password, and guest login
Aug 23, 2016 6:02AM PDT

Here is what I have done. Never had anything stolen, but I have done some research on this:

1. I have installed a firmware password on my macbook. This is VERY IMPORTANT. If you do not have a firmware password, someone can simply go into the firmware, reinstall the OS, and any tracing software you have installed will no longer work. I believe this includes find my mac.
2. I have installed the PREY system. This goes into your low-level OS, and runs undetected in the background. If you ever lose your system, PREY gives you options, including locking the computer, taking pictures with the camera remotely, etc. And it's free for 3 devices.
3. Enable the guest account. If all you have on your system is your password-protected account, nobody can use the computer without reinstalling your system. If they don't turn it on, don't use it, how can it be located? Having a guest account enabled allows the thief to use your computer, leaving a trail of use that PREY or find my mac can use to locate the system, so you have a better chance of recovery.

Note: while I use find my iphone on my phone, I don't use it on my mac. There was a very well-reported story a while back about how someone hacked into another person's icloud account to steal their twitter handle. To slow down the true owner from stopping him, the thief used the find my mac feature to wipe his computer clean. That kind of power seems too dangerous to enable on my mac, even though it's backed up (another recommendation I have).

Oh, and one last thing: I use LastPass to generate passwords for my apple id, my prey password, and my firmware password. So chances are slim to nil that anyone will break any of this protection.

Sorry about your story, I wish you the best of luck finding it.

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Two weeks ago your best bet would have been
Aug 12, 2016 5:23PM PDT

Find my Phone on any Mac or iPhone.
If the Macbook is on, its position would be plotted on a map. The police will act on that if you tell them you have the location of the Macbook

But as mentioned by renegade600, the above should have been done within hours of you finding the laptop was stolen.
I guess you could get lucky though, your particular thief could be a Windows user not familiar with Find My Phone, it may still be on.

P

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Sorry for your loss.
Aug 12, 2016 6:30PM PDT

What renegade600 said... you're pretty much out of luck.

However... when you buy a new laptop, go to Absolute.com and purchase Lojack for Laptops. You can get a 3-year premium membership for under $100 (also includes a $1000 guarantee if not returned). It writes code to the BIOS that tells the laptop whenever it attaches to the internet it will call "home". So, even if the thief re-images or even replaces the hard drive, it will still call the company.

An investigator (usually a retired cop) is assigned and will gather ip info, watch the screen in real-time, and gather evidence to have the police get it for you. We use the corporate version at work (CompuTrace) and we have had about 7 laptops stolen over the last 10 years. 100% have been recovered! I made my wife and my mom get their MacBooks covered as soon as they bought them.

For the record, I'm an IT tech for county gov't. I love getting these laptops back. I feel pretty cool giving them back to my users.

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lo jack
Aug 19, 2016 6:43PM PDT

I did some research concerning LoJack some 3-4 years back since I was getting a laptop. In my research, I found the product wasn't worth it. So unless things have changed drastically since then?

Problems I remember

1. Local Authorities were reluctant to pursue the matter. One reason being was there was no way to prove the person who had it now stole it.
2.Tracking was ineffective (can't recall the reason though).
3. You could deactivate the software, but than you couldn't track it (or some such).
4. Guarantee was never honored.

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Good Thought
Aug 20, 2016 4:08AM PDT

Lojack for computers hopefully none of will have use it.

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Persistence Technology (Lo/Jack BIOS) Not Supported On Apple
Aug 20, 2016 8:22AM PDT

While Apple is listed as a partner with Absolute, I spoke to folks at the Apple Store and they said that the BIOS feature is not supported on MBPs, unlike my work-issued Thinkpad.

https://lojack.absolute.com/en/persistent

When checking the products that support this Persistence Technology, Apple is not found:

https://www.absolute.com/en/partners/compatibility

===

This pretty much means that once the SSD is wiped, all tracking agents are lost. This brings me up to another issue I have with Apple Products. That is Apple has the ability to track ALL of their devices. I found this out when my daughter's iPod was stolen at school. You register the device and it is synched with Apple to use, meaning they have the hardware information. Folks that were asking about device recovery, and on Apple's own forum, they responded how Apple was thinking about offering a last known list of IP addresses to the police, for a yearly subscription fee of $9.95. It turns out that they did not want to do this. The assumptions were that stolen iPods would indoctrinate previously unknown people to Apple, while Apple users would go out and buy replacement devices. It seems to benefit the company when a device is stolen, regardless of the impact on the customer.

Now, I believe Apple is able to track stolen devices when a capital crime is committed, but somehow they are not able or unwilling to run that same program to reclaim a customer's stolen equipment, and provide those results to the police.

This brings up an interesting ethics / legality question:

If a company is told a device is stolen, and they know where that device is, and they allow the thief to enjoy that product and even allow software to be installed on it so the their can enjoy their stolen goods--are they somehow complicit in the crime after the fact?

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And a wipe of the drive removes it on Windows PCs too.
Aug 20, 2016 8:28AM PDT

If all computers were traceable like you seem to want, I worry that we would have other privacy issues.

Yes, I am known to use the OS called TAILS when traveling.

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PCs supporting Persistence Technology survive reformatting
Aug 20, 2016 10:02AM PDT

The tech folks at work proved this with Lenovo Thinkpads before ordering licenses.

Apple registers all devices as a means to authenticate their licenses, in a similar way that Windows obtains the CPUID to ensure that you are not installing the product on multiple machines. It's just a few lines of code to correlate the machine and IP address on connection, or when the OS phones home. If you have websites, are you not familiar with the information you can obtain from people connecting to your site? Take that information, such as your hardware profile, and multiply that by a large factor and that is the information Apple and MS obtains.

For years, my brother refused to get EZPass for concerns of tracking, until I showed him the license plate scanners that are being installed on many major roadways and toll plaza, etc. The police drive through parking lots with them affixed to their cars. Your cell phone tracks you and can be remotely enabled without your knowledge. The only problem is that there isn't a centralized facility that merges all of this data, but once that happens...

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None of my PCs have this.
Aug 20, 2016 10:12AM PDT

I guess you are suggesting that all companies create traceable hardware.

For some reason that sounds 1984 to me. Funny thing about the license plate scanner. I was on a team that made one of those systems.

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So you didn't click on the link ../compatibility and select.
Aug 20, 2016 3:02PM PDT

Well, I guess you are the special one.

Perhaps you should check the link above, select a manufacturer and see which systems have their BIOS supporting it. Pick Lenovo, since that is the one I know works. Such as this small snippet:

"ThinkPad T Series 400, 400s, 410, 410i, 410s, 410si, 420, 420i, 420s, 420si, 43, 430, 430s, 430u, 431s, 43p, 440, 440p, 440s, 450, 450s, 460p, 460s, 500, 510, 510i, 520, 520i, 530, 540p, 550, 560, 60, 60p, 61, 61p"

"Our OEM partners embed Persistence technology into the BIOS or firmware of computers, netbooks, tablets, and smartphones during the manufacturing process. Once activated, our customers benefit from an extra level of security, persistence, and support."

Before my employer laid out money for over a thousand of laptops, they tested it.

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No Thinkpads at the office.
Aug 20, 2016 3:08PM PDT

Just a pile of Dells, Asus, and the last HPs (burned us so no more.)

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The Odds Are Against Finding Your MBP
Aug 12, 2016 6:54PM PDT

Hi Keletso

My condolences upon your lost Plain .

Since we’re not discussing finding a lost iPhone I’ll center my remarks to your lost MBP. The ability to trace a lost/stolen iOS device has been available since the release of iCloud in October 2011, the service became free for all iCloud users. Also, the service was made available as "Find My Mac" for Mac computers running OS X 10.7.2 "Lion" or later using iCloud.

That being said if you were running Lion and activated your iCloud account tracing your MBP is possible. All you need do is to log into your iCloud account from any computer (Mac or Windows) and select the “Find My iPhone” app. Unfortunately, since it’s been two (2) weeks either:

1. You haven’t logged into your iCloud account
2. If you have you didn’t activate iCloud on your MBP
3. You’re running an OSX older than lion
4. Your MBP was stolen by a tech savvy thief or knows someone with tech knowledge
5. They haven’t turned your MBP on
6. Worse yet for the thief that is – they rendered your MBR inoperable

A 3rd party protection/recovery software solution is Lo/Jack. It requires an annual subscription at $39, $59 or $75 depending on the level of protection you desire. Read about it here: http://www.lojack.com

Unfortunately, since it’s been two (2) weeks the chances of recovering your MBP are slim to none (barring a miracle). Good Luck!

Together Everyone Achieves More = T.E.A.M.

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Just install these softwares in your new purchase
Aug 13, 2016 12:02AM PDT

When you buy a new laptop just install Logmein or Prey Softwares. Their can trace where your thief is.

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Prey
Aug 19, 2016 7:05PM PDT

So far I have not needed to see how effective Prey is, but when my desktop went to the shop, I got a query from Prey on my laptop wondering if my [identified my desktop] was just off line or stolen, with instructions what to do if it was stolen. Price . Nothing. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prey_(software)See the details here.

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How far are you willing to go?
Aug 19, 2016 9:13PM PDT

I had a laptop stolen when my car was busted into and was able to pinpoint its location using software called Prey to a housing project near Chinatown. Unfortunately, the Chicago Police couldn't care less about a stolen laptop or a car with a busted window. They refused to let me file a police report; refused to do anything to recover the laptop using the information I provided and threatened to arrest me if I didn't leave the police station. I'm not making any of this up. Tracking software is useless in the real world if you live in an area where the police won't act. I wiped the drive remotely but I never got the laptop back.

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police not doing their job
Aug 19, 2016 11:51PM PDT

Make sure to complain to the head person at the police dept, I had to do this when deputies refused to take a report on vandalism to my car and such at my condo, having the cops ask me "are you buying or renting?" which I told them was none of their damn business, and "why don't you move?" - which I replied "why don't you do your job?" --

I believe in being courteous to the police, but if the head of the police dept won't handle this issue, go to the media -

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Improperly trained police?
Aug 20, 2016 12:02AM PDT

Lol, I used to deal with police a lot at my job. They got worse and worse over the several years. Maybe too much military training.

Had one instance where they asked if I wanted the person arrested, I said yes, that's why I called 911.

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The "law" often gets in the way.
Aug 20, 2016 12:15AM PDT

I've read the bulk of answers here and note that even if you can identify the precise location of the stolen item (laptop/PC/car/TV), police are often unwilling to pursue the matter.

When it comes to items that are "personal", I think that, regardless of legalities, there will be a trend toward the remote activation of dangerous "self-destruct" security measures.

Back in the 90s, I used to DJ which required carrying large heavy speakers in my vehicle. As an anti-theft precaution, there was a 12V battery fitted inside each unit with a painfully-pitched oscillator connected directly to the tweeters. This meant that if they were disconnected for more than about two hours the alarm would kick in guaranteeing that no matter where those speakers were hidden, the police would be inundated with noise complaints for about 48 hours. I actually had a "connect" module in my own vehicle to prevent them from going off, although it was interfaced with the car alarm as well: steal car, go deaf!

Car-jacking is so bad in South Africa that many vehicles are fitted with underbody flame throwers. When a driver is being threatened, he merely moves his foot slightly to the activation button (like the old-fashioned high-beam switch). The flame thrower is spark activated, capable of killing, and usually able to handle five activations before requiring a refill.

Sadly, I think that whether it's legal or not, potentially dangerous "self-protection" devices will start to appear on the market. "This laptop has not been logged in to a particular website for more than 35 hours, it will now activate an internal thermite layer." This may just destroy the laptop, or set an entire house on fire -- you can bet the police will act then, but probably not in your favor!

In my garage is an interesting looking box prominently labeled "Sex Toys". All it contains is blue/purple dye bombs of the type used to mark stolen money that won't wash off the skin for about a week. My previous vehicle, having an extremely dark interior, also had spray jets with that same dye.

Before laptops became de facto replacements for PCs there was a security card that could be installed into a vacant slot. On the backplate it had a primitive membrane keypad. If the PC had been subjected to significant movement while powered off over a period of time, the user was required to enter a passnumber on this keypad. Failure to do so, meant that the card would use any resource from dial-up modem to NIC in an effort to "phone home" forwarding as much data as possible so that the machine could be located.

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Tracing Laptop ?
Aug 20, 2016 4:03AM PDT

Sorry for your lost friend But like others said I am afraid it gone for good.

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Well the thing that should be done with
Aug 24, 2016 4:58AM PDT

every new PC purchased is to register them with the vendor. That way the serial number is registered and if the laptop is repaired in the future that serial number could be traced if you report it to Apple that it was stolen. That's a start but it's too late after the fact.