Joe J wrote:
> Just looking for some opinions. I got Lojack free for 1 year when I bought
> my first laptop and now it is expiring soon. They are offering me a renewal
> for $31.99 per year, a 20% discount.
> I'm retired and the only time the laptop leaves the house is for vacations
> 5x per year. We use it to watch movies on the plane and check email. My
> main computer is my desktop so there is nothing on the laptop that isn't
> replaceable.
> My opinion is I don't need it but I thought I'd get some other
> viewpoints-maybe.
> Joe
Once your laptop gets stolen, do you really want it back in whatever
condition it might be in? Are you really going to wait for its recovery
and eventual return to you? If it gets recovered, it probably will be
evidence which means you won't be getting it back anytime soon. You
don't have it covered by your insurance? What's the deductible? Is
both hardware AND software (not data, just apps) covered? Once stolen
you can immediately submit a claim. Once the claim is paid and should
the laptop get recovered, it'll be the property of the insurance
company. Let them deal with the battered item.
If your only concern is that the thief cannot get at your data (credit
card numbers, social security number, bank account numbers, etc) then
why not consider something free that encrypts your data or encrypts the
partitions on your hard disks? TrueCrypt is free. It can create
encrypted containers that look like drives in which you can store your
data files. It can also be used to encrypt an entire partition. You
must enter a password to access the encrypted container or partition.
You might want to ask in the alt.comp.freeware group for what whole-disk
encryption schemes are available and are free. In fact, some laptops
already have this capability to lockout or encrypt partitions on hard
disks but you didn't mention which one you have (I know some of the IBMs
have the chip and hardware support for drive encryption).
If the thief only wants your hardware, they'll wipe the hard disks and
install whatever OS and apps they want. All that money spent in
software-based tracking of your laptop will be erased. For those
tracking products that add code into the BIOS, well, thieves can flash
the BIOS just as well as you can. They'll do the wipe BEFORE they ever
connect to a network. If the thief wants your data, tracking software
doesn't protect you. After all, the software on the hard drives or in
the BIOS can only work when it is running. Nothing prevents the thief
from taking out your hard disks and slaving them to another host where
all files and sectors are merely read and never executed.
What good is knowing where is your laptop and someday after law
enforcement gets done with it as evidence then getting back if in the
meantime your credit card or bank accounts have been misused? Even if
you remotely locked up your laptop after it was stolen (something you
can only hope will work), that does nothing to prevent the thief from
wiping your laptop and still using the hardware.
They promise to recover your stolen computer. How long after it gets
recovered will YOU actually get the computer returned to you? They are
not legal law enforcement agents. They'll have to plea with police to
recover your laptop. If the police do recover it, you think they're not
going to use it as evidence against the defendent? You think the police
are just going to walk into someone's home, grab your laptop, and walk
away without doing anything to the person from whom they took the
laptop? You'll notice that their recovery guarantee - which is
available ONLY with their *premium* (expensive) service and only covers
up to $1000 - doesn't specify WHEN you get back your computer, or what
condition it will be in, and nothing about protecting your data.
For the $59 they charge for their premium service that provides some
guarantee that you get some value back for your stolen laptop, you sure
you couldn't find an insurer that would charge that, or less, to cover
your laptop (hardware and software)? For that price per year, you might
even be able to include a replacement value clause where you get full
price for the stolen item instead of some pro-rated depreciated value.
With the insurance, you collect now and get a new laptop now. With
tracking, you have to wait until (and *if*) your stolen laptop phones
home and then wait for the tracking company to work with police to
retrieve the laptop and then wait until that laptop is no longer
considered evidence and get it back in whatever condition it was left by
the thief and handling by the police, shippers, and tracking service.
So just how expensive is this laptop that you would bother with all of
that to attempt to recover it? Are you going to pay the premium service
price to have some guarantee rather than "they'll try"? Also, did you
ask them just WHERE are their "theft recovery territories"? They will
not be able to recover stolen laptops from some countries.
So isn't your desktop computer covered by your insurance? Doesn't sound
like you have lojack on your desktop. Well, what are you going to do
when your house get burglarized? Why would you protect your laptop but
not protect your desktop? It only takes one burglary to let your
realize just how vulnerable you are. You feel safe now but you'll feel
violated later when your household possessions disappear. So, if you
have insurance on your desktop, why isn't your laptop included?
If you are really using your laptop, are you going to wait the months it
takes for recovery into your very hands of the stolen laptop? Or might
you end up replacing that laptop long before then?
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