What is Digg?Sponsored by Travelzoo
Take Advantage of Ridiculously Low Holiday Airfares view!
travelzoo.com - Flights $52 and up for Thanksgiving, Christmas & New Year. But move on it now.
106 Comments
- MarkusX, on 11/25/2008, -3/+199When this feature will be hacked or show some sort of exploit possibility, script kiddies might just lock all lenovo owners out of their computers remotely using viral phone calls to your laptops. Am I too paranoid?
- BossKey, on 11/26/2008, -4/+124IBM sold ThinkPad to Lenovo in China, and now the Chinese have a remote kill switch for the most popular business laptop in America. No big deal...what's the worst that could happen?
- flashback99, on 11/26/2008, -2/+78you don't really have a girlfriend.
- Armughan, on 11/26/2008, -1/+70When i get drunk, i send out messages i'm not supposed to.
- sanman, on 11/26/2008, -3/+59DeathNote - laptop edition
- Lane, on 11/26/2008, -4/+38Girlfriend finds pron* hey hun can I see your phone real quick?
- DanBoodro, on 11/26/2008, -2/+28Okay, so does this lock the hard drive itself? or just lock the motherboard from accessing the hard drive? Because, I mean really, how easy is it to crack one of these bad boys open and just snatch the hard drive?
Another little interesting idea would be to use cell tower triangulation to try to track down the laptop via it's 3G connection. - hpaavola, on 11/26/2008, -4/+26I don't get this. What's the point if it leaves the hard drive intact?
- muniak, on 11/26/2008, -2/+24It's a gimmick.
- inactive, on 11/26/2008, -1/+20duh. Thats why we have porn.
- inactive, on 11/26/2008, -5/+24and www.2girls1cup.com
- camintmier, on 11/26/2008, -3/+21Oh hell, I've got a Len{#`%${%&`+'${`%&NO CARRIER")
- tnoy, on 11/26/2008, -0/+17On the two T42 and T61 I have, there is one screw, and the drive slides out.
- AlekNovi, on 11/26/2008, -1/+16Exactly
- Piha, on 11/26/2008, -2/+16Well kindof clever, but not foolproof by a long shot.
1. Disable the transmitter (physically?)
2. Turn the Notebook on where there's no coverage
3. Swap the Hard-drive to another notebook (could it be that easy?)
4. Slave the HDD off a desktop, copy off whatever you want.
They seem like the obvious ones, wonder if any thought has gone into these issues. - KibibyteBrain, on 11/26/2008, -1/+15A business should never ever use a manufacturer default install of an OS for anything more than trivial tasks and should have their own image. That is common sense. Perhaps this story shows that IT managers should now be just as weary of the BIOS. Hopefully there will be a way to flash this feature out. And if there isn't, perhaps that will be a new selling point of laptops.
- LilRabbitFooFoo, on 11/26/2008, -0/+14Considering that ransoming back stolen data from laptops is one way organized crime makes its money, no, I don't think you are being paranoid.
- Solkre, on 11/26/2008, -0/+12Truecrypt entire drive.
The guy will sell or format it way before he gets close to getting in.
Oh yah, don't let your customers sticky note the password on the laptop either >. - unusualbob, on 11/26/2008, -0/+11some people steal laptops for their street value, not their data. This is a good way to make laptops a less likely target for theft.
- shezzy153, on 11/26/2008, -1/+10logged in to dig you up :) I think its hilarious... But can we mention the cause of death in next 40 secs or is it always the same old crash?
- cornerback42, on 11/26/2008, -0/+9If the HD doesn't come with a container of sulfuric acid (3ml enough to immerse the HD and fry it making it nonreadable) then count me out.
My buddy works for the gov't and his has a glass tube and you send a certain code out (via computer, its sat linked) and it activates a sharp small needle that breaks the glasstube. It melts it and renders it useless, its always powered running on a standby battery internally. - merku, on 11/26/2008, -0/+9GSM based security systems aren't very effective, because a simple reception blocker will do the trick.
- yuravian, on 11/26/2008, -1/+9Did anyone RTFA? there's a passcode to unlock it. Not that it makes it any better, but if a script kiddie locks you out you can just log back in. Plus as someone else said, it should have a whitelist so they have to know your number and I'm betting they'd have to know the code you send via SMS (that should be a no brainer to Lenovo).
Personally, I think it's a scam. They already have your data, locking it just makes it take that much longer. I have a trick: Don't be stupid, and keep your laptop as safe as you want to keep the data on it. Sensitive Data = Sensitive Laptop = keep it safe you clown. - hamstix, on 11/26/2008, -0/+8Are you one of those people who wanna try out every feature beforehand?
- ethana2, on 11/26/2008, -1/+8Pssh.
~/Private with symlinks for .mozilla
Sure a lot easier than self destructing bios'es. I wouldn't want that feature in my bios because with how buggy they are it would probably kill itself for no reason. At least all it can do to me now is heat halt my gpu and crash. - inactive, on 11/26/2008, -0/+7 PC phone home.
- cawpin, on 11/26/2008, -0/+7They could just be activating the hard drive locking feature built into the IDE and SATA standards. It is actually like a BIOS password. It prevents the drive from being used at all until the password is entered or the manufacturer unlocks it. Even if you put it in another machine it doesn't matter. It is in the DRIVE. The data is still in the clear but inaccessible. Really, the only way to get at it would be to transfer the platters to another drive case.
- ErrorLoading, on 11/26/2008, -0/+7Unfortunately spoofing SMS is pudd.
- Piha, on 11/26/2008, -0/+6They'd still have to send a SMS presumably?
The SW should be smart enough to only whitelist certain recognised numbers.
... emphasis on the "should be" :) - inactive, on 11/26/2008, -0/+6 When this kind of thing becomes more widespread laptops will be less attractive to steal.
- yodacallmesome, on 11/26/2008, -1/+7Better yet, have the PC identify its location.
- doolittle, on 11/26/2008, -0/+6Still not better than a drive encrypted with truecrypt (or dmcrypt depending on your os), I think there would be a way to set the BIOS to factory default despite it having a lockout. With a encrypted hdd, they really can't access the data very easily or quickly, even if it is relocated to other hardware - they will have to resort to reformatting it to make it usable.
- inactive, on 11/26/2008, -0/+6sonys got one where they can explode the battery of anyone who types an anti sony com
- mu0p, on 11/26/2008, -2/+7WTF ARE YOU TALKING ABOUT
- notwizt, on 11/26/2008, -1/+6Aw c'mon. Exposing all your important data for deletion by a piece of information so short it can be contained in an sms, with no information on how securely this is being stored on the remote server?
Seems legit. - stormofswords, on 11/26/2008, -0/+5I'm afraid I can't do that, Dave.
- cornerback42, on 11/26/2008, -1/+6It's too bad you don't have close friends. I find this to be pretty consistent but I've never came across a group of buddies like mine. We all (7 of us) still keep in touch, same old ***** just older now. I don't see why I can't say that, it's not top secret. I have no clue whats on it, personally I don't care. I just thought it was relevant to the topic/comment above.
- rabidg00se, on 11/26/2008, -0/+5No, they use polonium.
- commentposted, on 11/26/2008, -0/+5No.
- azbmr, on 11/26/2008, -0/+5Also there is www.truecrypt.org
- zoydberg, on 11/26/2008, -4/+9use a firewall, rtfm and do some research
- GamerX, on 11/26/2008, -1/+6now talk about kill switches!
- tech42er, on 11/26/2008, -0/+5What if he drops his laptop?
- junkneo, on 11/26/2008, -0/+5Cool. But remember this - every new solution to a man made problem, creates at least two additional problems - exploits of this "kill-text" and you yourself misusing it.
- h3110, on 11/26/2008, -0/+4Misleading title. Doesn't actually "kill" the notebook as in delete files or explode. Just disables it and you can restore it later.
They have a commercial software like this for Windows Mobile 5 and 6 phones. You simply text your phone a code and it'll text you back to ask what you want to do (lock, reinstall, send GPS info). It happens silently in the background so the theft or founder won't know what's happening.
http://www.spritesoftware.com/?page_id=280 - lilbitmoreslyk, on 11/26/2008, -0/+4what the ***** is up with these Bendecho links on every other comment board?
- SteveMax, on 11/26/2008, -0/+4It's called "spam", and it's one of the main reasons for the existance of a "report it" link under buried comments.
- JayD16, on 11/26/2008, -0/+4You need to know what his laptop looks like...those are the rules.
- PhailQuail, on 11/26/2008, -0/+4Sanman's Laptop
Battery Explosion - MachineMessiah, on 11/26/2008, -3/+7MULDER! DO WE HAVE THE KILL SWITCH? DO WE HAVE IT?
*"Twilight Time" starts playing* -
Show 51 - 100 of 107 discussions
© Digg Inc. 2009
— Content created and posted by Digg users is