7 ms·

How I Got My Stolen Laptop Back Within 24 Hours Using Prey

124 points by Dougvs 15y ago

thibaut_barrere 15y ago
I've read a couple of stories like these and still wonder if thieves tend to format the hard-drive or not. To avoid that, I created a "honeypot" account which is automatically logged in on my machines (OS X), so at least the machine seems usable without reformatting (and Prey remains effective). Any other similar tips or things to take care of to secure a Mac in particular?
- Periodic 15y ago
  I wondered about this as well. If I were professionally stealing laptops, my first instinct would be to disconnect power/battery, then boot from CD and image the HDD for later identity theft. From there a reinstall would be in order. All the theives seem to just open it up and start using it. I also password protect my laptop. I wonder if I shouldn't to encourage immediate use for information gathering.
  - 38leinad 15y ago
    if they were smarter, they certainly would not end as thiefs ;-)
    - shabble 15y ago
      Not necessarily, but maybe if they were smarter, they wouldn't be caught thieving :)
      - palish 15y ago
        I certainly wasn't! Oh...
        stanchan 15y ago
        If I found a laptop I would: 1. PC... pop out the BIOS battery to clear the BIOS password, re-flash the BIOS, DoD wipe the harddrive and install Windows fresh. 2. Mac... pop out the battery, wipe the PRAM, DoD wipe the harddrive and install OSX fresh.
        palish 15y ago
        'twas a joke bro. If I found a laptop, I'd do everything in my power to return it to its owner.
        yardie 15y ago
        I miss the old firmware PowerMacs. You could reprogram the firmware to lock the boot sequence with a password. Unlike BIOS the firmware was NVRAM so popping the battery and resetting the PRAM wouldn't change much. The only way to get past the firmware was to replace the motherboard.
    - lutorm 15y ago
      Have you seen the movie with the subtitle "the smartest guys in the room"? I'm not sure I agree with you. Maybe they wouldn't be stealing laptops but instead be defrauding an entire state...
  - CapitalistCartr 15y ago
    Your education and intellect are not typical of the thieving crowd.
  - jm4 15y ago
    All there theives seem to just open it up and start using it. Every missing/recovered laptop story I've ever seen on HN has a screenshot of the thief on Facebook. I imagine there is some degree of selection bias. The story about the recovered laptop (with pictures of the thief) is much more interesting than the one about the laptop that disappeared forever. Plus, it's much easier to catch a thief when you have access to their Facebook profile. Still, it's funny to think about all these thieves running off with laptops just so they can get their Facebook fix.
- Dougvs 15y ago
  Thats a great idea. I think I will do the same thing to avoid that reformatting risk
- joshAg 15y ago
  if you're really worried about a wiped/new hdd, lojack for laptops will embed itself in the BIOS, which allows it to survive OS reinstalls and replaced hdds. I have it on my thinkpad, and despite numerous windows reinstalls and a couple hard drive replacements, it's still on my system.
  - bluebl8de 15y ago
    It's pretty easy to wipe lojack from your laptop BIOS... I did it a few times before.
    - joshAg 15y ago
      sure, but how many people would even think to wipe the OS or replace the hdd because of something like prey or lojack, let alone wipe the bios?
- b0o 15y ago
  with the mac you should check out the hacker at defcon who had his mac stolen and see the techniques he used to retrieve it.
- burrokeet 15y ago
  oh i like that idea a lot! I have prey installed in stand-alone mode, but instead of having it check for a url, i just have cron running it every 30 minutes and emailing the photo and screenshot and other info to a gmail account i made. I figure if it gets stolen, I might not have time (or remember) to turn on the url before its too late. I also have the firmware pw set (Macbook Pro) - not sure how easy this it to circumvent - if you can't circumvent it then you can't reformat that easily.
  - milhous 15y ago
    Not sure if this applies to all Intel Macs, but once the EFI firmware password is set, only Apple can break it by calling support or going to an Apple Store. http://support.apple.com/kb/TS2391 http://support.apple.com/kb/TS2391 I've lost laptops before, and always called Apple to make a note of the serial number. What I'm not sure of is whether or not Apple would hold the laptop if it was flagged, or return it back. I'm second guessing my decision to FileVault the entire disc on the MBA, because I think this prevents automated login. The honeypot account makes a ton of sense.
    - applegenius 15y ago
      once the EFI firmware password is set, only Apple can break it by calling support or going to an Apple Store. Actually, all you need to do is add or remove a stick of RAM and then reset the PRAM 3 times in a row. More: http://www.davidjmoore.com/2008/04/13/bypassing-the-efi-firmware-password-on-a-mac/ http://www.davidjmoore.com/2008/04/13/bypassing-the-efi-firm...
- mahyarm 15y ago
  I'm guessing that most thieves, like most people, don't even know what 'formatting the hard drive' means, or even how to do it if they knew it meant erase the hard drive completely. Many people think the hard drive is the actual desktop box in many cases. It probably sounds like repairing the distributor cap on a car.
- joeguilmette 15y ago
  1. Set a Firmware password. They will be unable to reinstall the OS or flash the HD without opening the case and messing with hardware. With a MacBook Air it is essentially impossible. 2. Create a Guest Account. This prevents you from using FileVault.
  - robert-boehnke 15y ago
    I feel like in this regard, the pre-Lion FileVault that only encrypted your home folder was superior, as it left you the opportunity of creating a honey pot. Now I have to decide between a potential thieves having access to my unencrypted files and a chance of me getting returned my laptop or knowing my files safe but having to buy a new machine
    - urza 15y ago
      You can use TrueCrypt to encrypt only the parts of filesystem you want.
wgx 15y ago
Love these stories - but, although I have Prey installed, my account is passworded and full-disk encryption is on too. So I guess it would be a reformat for the thief and no Prey for me?
- sorbus 15y ago
  Yeah, if it's impossible for a thief to use the computer then Prey is useless. It's why I have a guest account on my computer: if someone steals it, I want them to be able to get it online so that I have some chance of recovering it.
  - wgx 15y ago
    Just checked, and you can't use Guest accounts if FileVault is on (makes sense of course).
    - deleted 15y ago
      [deleted]
    - codenerdz 15y ago
      Thats a problem i have as well, filefault 2 is great, but the end user/thief wont be able to report his location via a prey app. There is got to be a workaround....
      - Dobbs 15y ago
        The easiest is to make two installs of OSX on the machine. The first has full admin access and prey running. The second has full disk encryption and locked down. Default boot into the first partition. If the system is stolen they will reboot and you can track. Because it has full admin they are less likely to reinstall.
        bluebl8de 15y ago
        That doesn't seem very practical.
raganwald 15y ago
As an entirely personal note, I like the tone of this particular account. The author avoids the moral and legal morass of identifying someone who has not (yet) been convicted of a crime, and the article appears to focus on describing what happened and how he recovered the laptop rather than attempting to punish or shame the alleged thieves, vigilante style. Refreshing.
fromany 15y ago
"...he was even bragging to his friends about buying a 17” laptop for “$2250” and saying that he “bought it”..." Well, he might have bought it from the original thief. Just saying
marquis 15y ago
I love the idea but I have been trouble actually getting the software working (network issues connecting to server during install and now also their control panel): Says 'down for everyone'. http://www.downforeveryoneorjustme.com/http://control.preyproject.com http://www.downforeveryoneorjustme.com/http://control.preypr...
- covercash 15y ago
  I'm having this issue as well, it's not just you.
  - marquis 15y ago
    I'm really happy to hear they are getting a lot of attention, and I hope they make a paid service with an SLA - I'd happily be charged a yearly fee knowing that it was keeping their servers up and my computer might stand a chance of phoning home.
    - joshAg 15y ago
      check out lojack for laptops, if you want something with a guarantee. since it embeds itself in the BIOS it will survive hdd replacements and os wipes, too. I have it on my thinkpad, and it's survived numerous hdd replacements and os wipes. the only downside i can think of is that it doesn't support linux.
      - bluebl8de 15y ago
        You can easily wipe the BIOS.
        nemetroid 15y ago
        Sure, but it's unlikely a thief would.
- jannes 15y ago
  That's probably because this story went viral. On their homepage http://preyproject.com/ http://preyproject.com/ they have a "What people are saying" section in which they display recent tweets that mention prey. Nearly all of them are about this story.
locci 15y ago
He left all that in a parked car? The faith people on the other side of the Atlantic put in strangers astonishes me every time. Leaving the keys to your car inside the car, leaving the front door open go against the most basic sense of responsability I've been taught, to the point that I feel uneasy the whole travel when I have to leave the car unlocked while on a ferry boat. L'occasione fa l'uomo ladro - Opportunity makes a thief
- noahc 15y ago
  It's weird to me that you WOULDN"T feel secure doing that. I grew up in a rural community where you left your car keys in the car and the door unlocked. It wasn't uncommon to see $100,000+ pieces of farm equipment sitting out in the field with the keys still in them. To me it seems odd that you would tolerate having to lock everything up.
  - mellifluousmind 15y ago
    It really depends on where you are from. If you are born and raised in Asia, or in urban America, I don't think you would feel comfortable leaving things unlocked. Last time I checked, Windsor, Ontario, Canada has such a friendly neighborhood that they do often leave their home doors unlocked. Whether that's a good idea or not, it is up to you. Personally, I keep it locked, just for a peace of mind.
  - aangjie 15y ago
    I will observe that farm equipment vs electronic equipment usually have a huge difference in physical size. Also you seem to be referring to motorable farm equipment.But i assume they don't have a very good speed.* *- I may be wrong about the speed limit part.
- qx24b 15y ago
  It depends mostly on the habits from where you live, I personally leave things unlocked at home half the time because I only have 5 neighbors in a few mile radius but when I go to the city you can bet my car doors are locked but it is likely that I would leave a camera or laptop in my car for a while. It also depends on where you are at, I wouldn't do it in a city I don't know or a part of town I don't like but some things are familiar and generally safe.
forget_passwd 15y ago
Prey looks cool, but... a non-ssl sign-up/login? Ridiculous!
- mike-cardwell 15y ago
  The login/signup/control panel all used to sit on "control.preyproject.com". I wrote a HTTPS-Everywhere ruleset for it at the time to force it onto https. It seems to have moved to "panel.preyproject.com" now though. https does exist there, but it's not redirected to by default. Anyway, I've just wrote an update for the HTTPS-Everywhere PreyProject ruleset for this and requested that it is pulled in to the main repo. It's currently sat here: https://github.com/mikecardwell/https-everywhere/commit/aa9f2f70f7c69b19c30feb1ead4462a8b8f92adf https://github.com/mikecardwell/https-everywhere/commit/aa9f... But they're usually quite quick to pull in my rulesets.
  - forget_passwd 15y ago
    That's good news, thanks!
pacomerh 15y ago
I like this product but what are the odds of this story being a hoax just to promote it.
- 0x12 15y ago
  What are the odds of recovering your laptop, without and with a tool like this installed? The statistics could very well be something on the order of 2% and 2.003% (I made that up). Without a much larger sample size than these anecdotes can provide it is impossible to make an informed decision.
- sorbus 15y ago
  Given that Prey is free, open source, and has been around for quite a while, I think that it's fairly unlikely that this is a hoax.
  - pacomerh 15y ago
    Good point
- b0o 15y ago
  when prey first started they also posted a link to their service on hn as well and if you donated anything to them they gave you a lifetime premium subscription. prey is pretty damn helpful, and i install it on everything i've got. btw i dont work for them, and i've never seen them advertise anywhere, but this would be good advertisement...
forgotusername 15y ago
As an existing Prey user (for my Android phone) I'm left wondering what time remains before the tides turn on this kind of service, living in an age where a burglar can successfully sue for hurting themselves on your furniture while rummaging through your belongings, it couldn't be long. Here's a related article from last week: http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2011/08/absolute-sued-for-spying/ http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2011/08/absolute-sued-for-s... wherein an unwitting supply teacher bought a stolen laptop, only according to the judge to have had her privacy violated by the company attempting to recover it. That example aside, it doesn't require contrived thinking to fathom scenarios where an "anti theft" feature of a conveniently placed (extremely cheap, mass produced[, say 5 years from now]) phone might be intentionally used to spy on someone. Compare and contrast with existing wiretapping laws and consider how similar these services already are (at least in my mind). It's also vaguely interesting that this user installed Prey and almost forgot about it, i.e. here Prey is basically your typical "crapware" that a tech friend might clean off the laptop along with accumulated toolbars and suchlike. (Sorry for the fragmented English, somewhat inebriated)
- ubasu 15y ago
  There are already several related apps that allow you to track your children, keep tabs on your spouse etc.
- georgieporgie 15y ago
  living in an age where a burglar can successfully sue for hurting themselves on your furniture while rummaging through your belongings Do you have a source for that? Frankly, I don't believe it. wherein an unwitting supply teacher bought a stolen laptop She bought a two year-old laptop from a student at an 'Alternative' school for $60. It had its serial number removed. Good luck to her in convincing any jury that she didn't knowingly receive stolen goods. The judge did't rule that her privacy was violated, only that "a reasonable jury could find that they crossed an impermissible boundary."
  - sukuriant 15y ago
    Google: "thief wins suit against homeowner" Edit: actually, doing some more reading, it seems like the first case that I read was actually a freak incident. Other laws protect you. Now I'm curious about what case this person is talking about.
thedangler 15y ago
Site must be busy. Taking forever for me to get registered.
ck2 15y ago
I am questioning these "discoveries" about prey - from their FAQ My computer/phone was stolen but Prey wasn’t installed on it. Is there something I can do? Not much, since you must install Prey before the actual theft takes place. If Prey isn’t installed (or if it wasn’t correctly set up) there’s no way we can track your device to see where it is. Sorry!
deleted 15y ago
[deleted]
mike-cardwell 15y ago
I have Windows installed on my laptop with a passwordless account, purely as a honeypot OS. Ubuntu is my main OS and it's hidden. I have Prey running in the honeypot OS. My laptop has a built in GPS unit which Prey is happy to take advantage of, so I should get a more accurate location reading if my laptop gets nicked than this guy. For more info on how I set things up: https://grepular.com/Protecting_a_Laptop_from_Simple_and_Sophisticated_Attacks https://grepular.com/Protecting_a_Laptop_from_Simple_and_Sop...

124 points by Dougvs 15y ago

I've read a couple of stories like these and still wonder if thieves tend to format the hard-drive or not. To avoid that, I created a "honeypot" account which is automatically logged in on my machines (OS X), so at least the machine seems usable without reformatting (and Prey remains effective). Any other similar tips or things to take care of to secure a Mac in particular?

Periodic 15y ago
I wondered about this as well. If I were professionally stealing laptops, my first instinct would be to disconnect power/battery, then boot from CD and image the HDD for later identity theft. From there a reinstall would be in order. All the theives seem to just open it up and start using it. I also password protect my laptop. I wonder if I shouldn't to encourage immediate use for information gathering.
- 38leinad 15y ago
  if they were smarter, they certainly would not end as thiefs ;-)
  - shabble 15y ago
    Not necessarily, but maybe if they were smarter, they wouldn't be caught thieving :)
    - palish 15y ago
      I certainly wasn't! Oh...
      - stanchan 15y ago
        If I found a laptop I would: 1. PC... pop out the BIOS battery to clear the BIOS password, re-flash the BIOS, DoD wipe the harddrive and install Windows fresh. 2. Mac... pop out the battery, wipe the PRAM, DoD wipe the harddrive and install OSX fresh.
        palish 15y ago
        'twas a joke bro. If I found a laptop, I'd do everything in my power to return it to its owner.
        yardie 15y ago
        I miss the old firmware PowerMacs. You could reprogram the firmware to lock the boot sequence with a password. Unlike BIOS the firmware was NVRAM so popping the battery and resetting the PRAM wouldn't change much. The only way to get past the firmware was to replace the motherboard.
  - lutorm 15y ago
    Have you seen the movie with the subtitle "the smartest guys in the room"? I'm not sure I agree with you. Maybe they wouldn't be stealing laptops but instead be defrauding an entire state...
- CapitalistCartr 15y ago
  Your education and intellect are not typical of the thieving crowd.
- jm4 15y ago
  All there theives seem to just open it up and start using it. Every missing/recovered laptop story I've ever seen on HN has a screenshot of the thief on Facebook. I imagine there is some degree of selection bias. The story about the recovered laptop (with pictures of the thief) is much more interesting than the one about the laptop that disappeared forever. Plus, it's much easier to catch a thief when you have access to their Facebook profile. Still, it's funny to think about all these thieves running off with laptops just so they can get their Facebook fix.
Dougvs 15y ago
Thats a great idea. I think I will do the same thing to avoid that reformatting risk
joshAg 15y ago
if you're really worried about a wiped/new hdd, lojack for laptops will embed itself in the BIOS, which allows it to survive OS reinstalls and replaced hdds. I have it on my thinkpad, and despite numerous windows reinstalls and a couple hard drive replacements, it's still on my system.
- bluebl8de 15y ago
  It's pretty easy to wipe lojack from your laptop BIOS... I did it a few times before.
  - joshAg 15y ago
    sure, but how many people would even think to wipe the OS or replace the hdd because of something like prey or lojack, let alone wipe the bios?
b0o 15y ago
with the mac you should check out the hacker at defcon who had his mac stolen and see the techniques he used to retrieve it.
burrokeet 15y ago
oh i like that idea a lot! I have prey installed in stand-alone mode, but instead of having it check for a url, i just have cron running it every 30 minutes and emailing the photo and screenshot and other info to a gmail account i made. I figure if it gets stolen, I might not have time (or remember) to turn on the url before its too late. I also have the firmware pw set (Macbook Pro) - not sure how easy this it to circumvent - if you can't circumvent it then you can't reformat that easily.
- milhous 15y ago
  Not sure if this applies to all Intel Macs, but once the EFI firmware password is set, only Apple can break it by calling support or going to an Apple Store. http://support.apple.com/kb/TS2391 http://support.apple.com/kb/TS2391 I've lost laptops before, and always called Apple to make a note of the serial number. What I'm not sure of is whether or not Apple would hold the laptop if it was flagged, or return it back. I'm second guessing my decision to FileVault the entire disc on the MBA, because I think this prevents automated login. The honeypot account makes a ton of sense.
  - applegenius 15y ago
    once the EFI firmware password is set, only Apple can break it by calling support or going to an Apple Store. Actually, all you need to do is add or remove a stick of RAM and then reset the PRAM 3 times in a row. More: http://www.davidjmoore.com/2008/04/13/bypassing-the-efi-firmware-password-on-a-mac/ http://www.davidjmoore.com/2008/04/13/bypassing-the-efi-firm...
mahyarm 15y ago
I'm guessing that most thieves, like most people, don't even know what 'formatting the hard drive' means, or even how to do it if they knew it meant erase the hard drive completely. Many people think the hard drive is the actual desktop box in many cases. It probably sounds like repairing the distributor cap on a car.
joeguilmette 15y ago
1. Set a Firmware password. They will be unable to reinstall the OS or flash the HD without opening the case and messing with hardware. With a MacBook Air it is essentially impossible. 2. Create a Guest Account. This prevents you from using FileVault.
- robert-boehnke 15y ago
  I feel like in this regard, the pre-Lion FileVault that only encrypted your home folder was superior, as it left you the opportunity of creating a honey pot. Now I have to decide between a potential thieves having access to my unencrypted files and a chance of me getting returned my laptop or knowing my files safe but having to buy a new machine
  - urza 15y ago
    You can use TrueCrypt to encrypt only the parts of filesystem you want.

wgx 15y ago

Love these stories - but, although I have Prey installed, my account is passworded and full-disk encryption is on too. So I guess it would be a reformat for the thief and no Prey for me?

sorbus 15y ago
Yeah, if it's impossible for a thief to use the computer then Prey is useless. It's why I have a guest account on my computer: if someone steals it, I want them to be able to get it online so that I have some chance of recovering it.
- wgx 15y ago
  Just checked, and you can't use Guest accounts if FileVault is on (makes sense of course).
  - deleted 15y ago
    [deleted]
  - codenerdz 15y ago
    Thats a problem i have as well, filefault 2 is great, but the end user/thief wont be able to report his location via a prey app. There is got to be a workaround....
    - Dobbs 15y ago
      The easiest is to make two installs of OSX on the machine. The first has full admin access and prey running. The second has full disk encryption and locked down. Default boot into the first partition. If the system is stolen they will reboot and you can track. Because it has full admin they are less likely to reinstall.
      - bluebl8de 15y ago
        That doesn't seem very practical.

raganwald 15y ago

As an entirely personal note, I like the tone of this particular account. The author avoids the moral and legal morass of identifying someone who has not (yet) been convicted of a crime, and the article appears to focus on describing what happened and how he recovered the laptop rather than attempting to punish or shame the alleged thieves, vigilante style. Refreshing.

fromany 15y ago

"...he was even bragging to his friends about buying a 17” laptop for “$2250” and saying that he “bought it”..." Well, he might have bought it from the original thief. Just saying

marquis 15y ago

I love the idea but I have been trouble actually getting the software working (network issues connecting to server during install and now also their control panel): Says 'down for everyone'. http://www.downforeveryoneorjustme.com/http://control.preyproject.com http://www.downforeveryoneorjustme.com/http://control.preypr...

covercash 15y ago
I'm having this issue as well, it's not just you.
- marquis 15y ago
  I'm really happy to hear they are getting a lot of attention, and I hope they make a paid service with an SLA - I'd happily be charged a yearly fee knowing that it was keeping their servers up and my computer might stand a chance of phoning home.
  - joshAg 15y ago
    check out lojack for laptops, if you want something with a guarantee. since it embeds itself in the BIOS it will survive hdd replacements and os wipes, too. I have it on my thinkpad, and it's survived numerous hdd replacements and os wipes. the only downside i can think of is that it doesn't support linux.
    - bluebl8de 15y ago
      You can easily wipe the BIOS.
      - nemetroid 15y ago
        Sure, but it's unlikely a thief would.
jannes 15y ago
That's probably because this story went viral. On their homepage http://preyproject.com/ http://preyproject.com/ they have a "What people are saying" section in which they display recent tweets that mention prey. Nearly all of them are about this story.

locci 15y ago

He left all that in a parked car? The faith people on the other side of the Atlantic put in strangers astonishes me every time. Leaving the keys to your car inside the car, leaving the front door open go against the most basic sense of responsability I've been taught, to the point that I feel uneasy the whole travel when I have to leave the car unlocked while on a ferry boat. L'occasione fa l'uomo ladro - Opportunity makes a thief

noahc 15y ago
It's weird to me that you WOULDN"T feel secure doing that. I grew up in a rural community where you left your car keys in the car and the door unlocked. It wasn't uncommon to see $100,000+ pieces of farm equipment sitting out in the field with the keys still in them. To me it seems odd that you would tolerate having to lock everything up.
- mellifluousmind 15y ago
  It really depends on where you are from. If you are born and raised in Asia, or in urban America, I don't think you would feel comfortable leaving things unlocked. Last time I checked, Windsor, Ontario, Canada has such a friendly neighborhood that they do often leave their home doors unlocked. Whether that's a good idea or not, it is up to you. Personally, I keep it locked, just for a peace of mind.
- aangjie 15y ago
  I will observe that farm equipment vs electronic equipment usually have a huge difference in physical size. Also you seem to be referring to motorable farm equipment.But i assume they don't have a very good speed.* *- I may be wrong about the speed limit part.
qx24b 15y ago
It depends mostly on the habits from where you live, I personally leave things unlocked at home half the time because I only have 5 neighbors in a few mile radius but when I go to the city you can bet my car doors are locked but it is likely that I would leave a camera or laptop in my car for a while. It also depends on where you are at, I wouldn't do it in a city I don't know or a part of town I don't like but some things are familiar and generally safe.

forget_passwd 15y ago

Prey looks cool, but... a non-ssl sign-up/login? Ridiculous!

mike-cardwell 15y ago
The login/signup/control panel all used to sit on "control.preyproject.com". I wrote a HTTPS-Everywhere ruleset for it at the time to force it onto https. It seems to have moved to "panel.preyproject.com" now though. https does exist there, but it's not redirected to by default. Anyway, I've just wrote an update for the HTTPS-Everywhere PreyProject ruleset for this and requested that it is pulled in to the main repo. It's currently sat here: https://github.com/mikecardwell/https-everywhere/commit/aa9f2f70f7c69b19c30feb1ead4462a8b8f92adf https://github.com/mikecardwell/https-everywhere/commit/aa9f... But they're usually quite quick to pull in my rulesets.
- forget_passwd 15y ago
  That's good news, thanks!

pacomerh 15y ago

I like this product but what are the odds of this story being a hoax just to promote it.

0x12 15y ago
What are the odds of recovering your laptop, without and with a tool like this installed? The statistics could very well be something on the order of 2% and 2.003% (I made that up). Without a much larger sample size than these anecdotes can provide it is impossible to make an informed decision.
sorbus 15y ago
Given that Prey is free, open source, and has been around for quite a while, I think that it's fairly unlikely that this is a hoax.
- pacomerh 15y ago
  Good point
b0o 15y ago
when prey first started they also posted a link to their service on hn as well and if you donated anything to them they gave you a lifetime premium subscription. prey is pretty damn helpful, and i install it on everything i've got. btw i dont work for them, and i've never seen them advertise anywhere, but this would be good advertisement...

forgotusername 15y ago

As an existing Prey user (for my Android phone) I'm left wondering what time remains before the tides turn on this kind of service, living in an age where a burglar can successfully sue for hurting themselves on your furniture while rummaging through your belongings, it couldn't be long. Here's a related article from last week: http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2011/08/absolute-sued-for-spying/ http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2011/08/absolute-sued-for-s... wherein an unwitting supply teacher bought a stolen laptop, only according to the judge to have had her privacy violated by the company attempting to recover it. That example aside, it doesn't require contrived thinking to fathom scenarios where an "anti theft" feature of a conveniently placed (extremely cheap, mass produced[, say 5 years from now]) phone might be intentionally used to spy on someone. Compare and contrast with existing wiretapping laws and consider how similar these services already are (at least in my mind). It's also vaguely interesting that this user installed Prey and almost forgot about it, i.e. here Prey is basically your typical "crapware" that a tech friend might clean off the laptop along with accumulated toolbars and suchlike. (Sorry for the fragmented English, somewhat inebriated)

ubasu 15y ago
There are already several related apps that allow you to track your children, keep tabs on your spouse etc.
georgieporgie 15y ago
living in an age where a burglar can successfully sue for hurting themselves on your furniture while rummaging through your belongings Do you have a source for that? Frankly, I don't believe it. wherein an unwitting supply teacher bought a stolen laptop She bought a two year-old laptop from a student at an 'Alternative' school for $60. It had its serial number removed. Good luck to her in convincing any jury that she didn't knowingly receive stolen goods. The judge did't rule that her privacy was violated, only that "a reasonable jury could find that they crossed an impermissible boundary."
- sukuriant 15y ago
  Google: "thief wins suit against homeowner" Edit: actually, doing some more reading, it seems like the first case that I read was actually a freak incident. Other laws protect you. Now I'm curious about what case this person is talking about.

thedangler 15y ago

Site must be busy. Taking forever for me to get registered.

ck2 15y ago

I am questioning these "discoveries" about prey - from their FAQ My computer/phone was stolen but Prey wasn’t installed on it. Is there something I can do? Not much, since you must install Prey before the actual theft takes place. If Prey isn’t installed (or if it wasn’t correctly set up) there’s no way we can track your device to see where it is. Sorry!

deleted 15y ago

[deleted]

mike-cardwell 15y ago

I have Windows installed on my laptop with a passwordless account, purely as a honeypot OS. Ubuntu is my main OS and it's hidden. I have Prey running in the honeypot OS. My laptop has a built in GPS unit which Prey is happy to take advantage of, so I should get a more accurate location reading if my laptop gets nicked than this guy. For more info on how I set things up: https://grepular.com/Protecting_a_Laptop_from_Simple_and_Sophisticated_Attacks https://grepular.com/Protecting_a_Laptop_from_Simple_and_Sop...