3 ms·

I leave my charger behind to mark my seat, and food items, but never leave my laptop, phone, or bag behind. I might leave a jacket I don't care much about. Ca

by rdl 13y ago

I leave my charger behind to mark my seat, and food items, but never leave my laptop, phone, or bag behind. I might leave a jacket I don't care much about. Carrying my laptop into the toilet sucks, but it really isn't an option. I feel really torn in places like airport lounges. There I will leave a bag containing a hidden laptop, but still not an exposed laptop. In a secure coworking space, the yc office, someone else's office, I might leave a laptop exposed, screenlocked, but not a phone or pile of cash. I want my own office to be a place where $10k cash, $50k watches, etc can be comfortably left unattended, but that is pretty high as a bar.

DanBC 13y ago
How much of that is dollar value of the device and how much is the frustration of having to restore from backup and hoping the crypto is good enough that the thief just formats and reinstalls?
- rdl 13y ago
  Generally my machines are full-disk-crypto, locked firmware, etc., so if one fell into random-criminal hands, it wouldn't be that horrible from an information-security perspective. Replacing a $3-4k laptop, $1-2k in random accessories in the bag, etc especially while on a trip would actually be quite painful, though. Single-round stolen laptop is probably survivable, just expensive and inconvenient. In international travel, the other thing I'm afraid of is surreptitious physical tampering of the machine itself by someone like the MSS, with it being returned to me for future use. i.e. someone adding a hw keylogger, or other modifications. I'm not particularly concerned about MSS doing this to me in the US, but if I were on a business trip in China, it would be top-of-mind, and I'd never let non-tamper-evident hardware out of my direct control. I don't leave laptops in hotel rooms in China; despite having some cool technology to detect tampering, it's not foolproof, and I'd prefer defense-in-depth. I also tend to use throwaway equipment (not my new rMBP) when going to a place like China, and will decommission it afterward (pull the drive, put a new drive in, eBay it). It's more of a pain now that I'm doing hardware stuff with prototypes. I'm working on secure bootloading as a feature, but even with that, I want to keep the physical design safe before production. Luckily they're pocket-sized.
gejjaxxita 13y ago
Leaving a bag in an airport lounge seems like it's likely to trigger a big security alert?
- rdl 13y ago
  Inside a first class lounge, especially in international terminals, people leave their carryon bags at their seats all the time (getting up to the bar, food, whatever). (I love that I basically pay cheapest coach fares, and through gaming FF programs and credit cards, am either in the business/first cabin, or at least have lounge access. It's a really fun game.)

by rdl 13y ago

DanBC 13y ago

How much of that is dollar value of the device and how much is the frustration of having to restore from backup and hoping the crypto is good enough that the thief just formats and reinstalls?

rdl 13y ago
Generally my machines are full-disk-crypto, locked firmware, etc., so if one fell into random-criminal hands, it wouldn't be that horrible from an information-security perspective. Replacing a $3-4k laptop, $1-2k in random accessories in the bag, etc especially while on a trip would actually be quite painful, though. Single-round stolen laptop is probably survivable, just expensive and inconvenient. In international travel, the other thing I'm afraid of is surreptitious physical tampering of the machine itself by someone like the MSS, with it being returned to me for future use. i.e. someone adding a hw keylogger, or other modifications. I'm not particularly concerned about MSS doing this to me in the US, but if I were on a business trip in China, it would be top-of-mind, and I'd never let non-tamper-evident hardware out of my direct control. I don't leave laptops in hotel rooms in China; despite having some cool technology to detect tampering, it's not foolproof, and I'd prefer defense-in-depth. I also tend to use throwaway equipment (not my new rMBP) when going to a place like China, and will decommission it afterward (pull the drive, put a new drive in, eBay it). It's more of a pain now that I'm doing hardware stuff with prototypes. I'm working on secure bootloading as a feature, but even with that, I want to keep the physical design safe before production. Luckily they're pocket-sized.

gejjaxxita 13y ago

Leaving a bag in an airport lounge seems like it's likely to trigger a big security alert?

rdl 13y ago
Inside a first class lounge, especially in international terminals, people leave their carryon bags at their seats all the time (getting up to the bar, food, whatever). (I love that I basically pay cheapest coach fares, and through gaming FF programs and credit cards, am either in the business/first cabin, or at least have lounge access. It's a really fun game.)