Undercover theft prevention

[David Cake]

At 3:32 PM -0800 13/11/06, Roland Torres wrote:
>Hmm..
>
>1. Zap PRAM
>2. Boot from external hard disk
>3. Wipe original boot disk
>4. Reinstall OS X
>
>You're good to go, no?

	As many people have pointed out, firmware password 
protection, and I assume few laptops are stolen by experienced Mac 
professionals (I've known quite repair shops who don't know how to 
get around firmware password protection).

	Also, if they don't have install media with the laptop, then 
they can't do 4, which makes it much harder to sell, and if they 
don't have a boot disk with OS X on it, then they can't do 2.

	Seriously, if they are good enough and prepared enough to do 
this, they are could charge more for the time than they'd make for 
the theft.
	Yes, laptop theft is a serious business - but they are 
professional thieves, not professional computer support people, and 
they get away with it by plausible deniability and quickly moving on, 
and (as Roger points out) law enforcement failing to seriously 
address the problem. Professional sellers sell dozens of different 
models in a month plus a few dozen other high tech gadgets, and if 
they were smart and dedicated enough to learn how to properly data 
clean all of them, they wouldn't be professional lowlives. Especially 
as, even if they manage to wipe the disk etc, it still doesn't 
protect them from genuine buyers taking it to a repair place, getting 
it reported as stolen, and leading the cops back to them.
	Cheers
		David