PRODUCT HELPS RECOVER A STOLEN PORTABLE COMPUTER
A laptop computer is an expensive piece of equipment and thieves love them. Over a million laptops are reported lost or stolen every year. What's even more distressing is that according to the FBI, less than 2 percent of them are ever recovered. And while the loss of this valuable equipment is bad enough, consider the likelihood that the owners of these stolen computers may be even more distressed about the loss of their stored data. Many times, the data residing on the stolen laptop proves to be even more valuable to its owner than the laptop itself.
Wouldn't it be great if there was some way you could track your stolen laptop much like you can track a stolen vehicle these days? After all, there's equipment such as LoJack and services like OnStar you can either buy or elect to have installed as a factory option onto a new car. These anti-theft products and services can pinpoint an automobile's location so that law enforcement agencies can move in, make arrests and recover your stolen property. If you fear the loss of your mobile computer and you want to do something to catch a thief, there is an anti-theft and tracking product you can buy.
nTracker, from Synet is a new anti-theft laptop tracking, recovery and data protection system that you can install on any mobile computer running Windows. The $49.95 software utility installs in a matter of minutes. Part of the setup procedure requires you to enter in some personal information such as your email address that will be used to receive tracking information and your special password that will give you access to the nTracker program itself.
Other configurations lets you setup the email transmission period which tells nTracker how often it needs to periodically send email to your address to insure that everything is operating as expected. In addition to the time duration, these emails will also be delivered if nTracker detects when the Internet Service Provider location changes. Although the changing of an ISP is not necessarily an indicator that your laptop has been swiped, it will more than likely be changed in the event that your laptop has been stolen.
nTracker can be set to surreptitiously notify you whenever it is connected to the Internet. It will do so on virtually any kind of broadband or dialup connection. When triggered, it will send you an email saying that it has been stolen along with location information without the thief ever knowing that his location is being transmitted. That location is the form of the thief's IP address which is a unique number that can help authorities track the computer's location. Other features include asking for a password when the computer is turned on. If the wrong password is entered more than three times, you can set nTracker to display one of three different warning messages. Courteous Persuasion says "Attention Please- This computer is now used by an unauthorized user. Please stop and call this number." Humorous advice says "Here is not my place. Please put me back to my place. I want to go back to my owner." Warning message says "This computer has been stolen or lost. Please call this number. Otherwise you may be involved in a legal problem." All of them display your contact information such as a phone number and email address. Personally, I'm not too sure as to how much of a deterrent these warning messages will be to a crook. My advice would be to leave them tuned off so as to not tip off the perpetrator that the computer has something on it that knows he's stolen the computer. An alerted thief may not then connect your laptop to the Internet in fear that it may be traced.
You can also set up nTracker so that it will automatically encrypt any files on the hard drive when it detects that an illegal entry has been made. nTracker has additional safety features such as boot protection that disables entry by the use of a bootable floppy disk or CD.
According to Synet, nTracker cannot be detected by anti-virus programs or stopped by corporate or personal firewalls in its attempt to reach you. It also cannot be removed even with a complete reformatting of the hard disk drive. It can only be removed by using the original CD and the special password used to originally install it.
I've learned that nothing is foolproof and if your stolen property lands in the hands of a hacking professional, your system may very well be toast. But short of something like that happening, you may find that the use of something like nTracker might result in the recovery of your stolen computer, or at the very least, protect your personal information from prying eyes.
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