Originally posted by: andrewjm
I was wondering if a laptop is stolen, and you know the IP address that the stolen laptop is accessing the internet on, is there anything you, yourself can do?
I know there are programs that will work with local law enforcement, but if I were to call local law enforcement myself if I had the IP address, would they do anything?
No--they wouldn't
The programs you mention ( like Computrace by Absolute software) are a licensed software distro and also feature call centers that monitor for the laptop. You laptop is always "phoning home" via it's lan connectivity, or modem. Once it is stolen, you create a "ticket" with the software company's call center, and they wait for the notebook to phone home the next time it connects. They are accreditted in some way with law enforcement and will have better luck getting the local police department to get a warrant, or cooperation through the connections ISP. Most, also offer the ability to push a command down to the laptop that will wipe the drive the next time/first time it connects after theft to ensure data security.
The thing to keep in mind is that the solution is only as good as you implement it. You HAVE TO disable the ability of your lappy to boot to network, CD, as well USB, to prevent the reloading of the drive while it's in the unit. Also suggested is the setting of a power on password if the lappy supports it as well a Hard drive password if the lappy supports it. (ThinkPads do.) If a HD password is set then moving the drive out to another system will not give them access to the drive.
Typical license fee is $49 with a $200 to $400 recovery fee should they get it back. remember- THe main reason you want to implement this is to protect your data, NOT THE HARDware, though if you get both back, you can be happy.
The reason I know so much is that we install Computrace on select systems at work. We've run into problems with computrace and other software apps, mainly IBM's RRPC back up program-though they have issued some fixes. We haven't had to call them yet and issue a ticket though.
I hope this helps.