Stolen and lost laptops in the UK: do you want to be the next victim?

Alexandra | 9:53 pm | December 7, 2009 | Security

Every week thousands of people lose their laptops. According to the last study conducted by Dell, business travellers lose more than 15,500 laptops per week (in the EU). A researcher has found that London Heathrow has the highest number of missing or stolen laptops (900 gadgets a week).

Unfortunately, most of people in the United Kingdom don’t undertake any measures to ensure security of their personal information which they keep on their mobile computers. Lost or stolen laptop means not only loss of your device but also moral damage and loss of valuable information (not only your private letters and photos, collections of favourite videos and music). For most of businesspeople loss of information takes the form of unrecovered damages, loss of money and reputation. But nevertheless Dell statistic shows that the British don’t realize consequences of their carelessness:

• “My data is not backed up” – that was the answer of 43% of respondents in the UK.
• “I do not take steps to protect my confidential information” – 59%.
• “Sometimes I left my laptop under the supervision of my fellow passenger” – 42%.
• “I employ disk encryption” – only 12%.
• “I use biometric methods to secure my laptops” – only 6% (while fingerprint scanner systems prevent unauthorised access to Toshiba, IBM, Lenovo, ASUS and many other laptops).

There are lots of gadgets and software products that can help you reduce negative consequences of the loss of data. Firefound (add-on for Firefox and Fennec) is one such solution. It cleans your personal data in just a few simple clicks and enables you to find your stolen computer.

Firefound uses geolocation to determine your current position and sends this information to your laptop (using it like an internet server). If your mobile computer is lost then you can get into the web interface of Fifefound and get to know where your laptop is and remove all your personal data.

You can also configure levels of safety in such a way that you will receive a letter if your laptop is used more than a certain number of miles away from your location. Or Firefound will remove your personal information if criminal is not able to enter the correct password with the X number of attempts.

But remember that it’s much easier to prevent such problems than to fight them, by keeping your laptop from getting lost or stolen.