Posts Tagged ‘absolute in the news’

Earlier this month, PC World posted a true story about a man who was able to recover his stolen laptops using a free remote-access service, LogMeIn.

The story was this: David Krop left 2 laptops in his SUV in a parking garage while he attended a meeting. The computers were stolen and they weren’t even password protected. However, David had a trial access of LogMeIn installed, which allowed him to remotely access his laptop. He was able to use this service to see that his stolen laptop was being used by its alleged thief. By spying on this person, and collecting all his personal information as he browsed the internet (including his face via a video chat), Krop was able to supply information to the police. The police were then able to recover the laptop.

Now, this sounds like a good deal, right? However, it’s a pretty a-typical situation to be in, and does not guarantee laptop recovery. The scenario depended on many factors, including:

• That the unauthorized user did not dismiss the tracking icon that appeared when his laptop activity was being watched
• That the unauthorized user would reveal a wide variety of detailed personal information while using the laptop (phone number, email address, face)
• That the unauthorized user wouldn’t wipe all the existing software off the computer

As you can see, using LogMeIn or other free laptop tracking or remote access services is not the same thing as using a dedicated laptop tracking & recovery program and service such as Computrace or LoJack for Laptops from Absolute Software. Only Absolute has a dedicated Theft Recovery Team to work with police to recover your computer. Our software does not require your to sit around waiting for the alleged thief to supply detailed information about him/herself – all investigations and tracking are done on your behalf.  And you don’t have to hope to talk a police officer into taking on your case – we have existing relationships with local police around the world. Also, most PCs also now have our software at the BIOS level, protecting it from being wiped if software is deleted. So even if a crafty thief that tries to remove the software, the BIOS firmware will make sure its installed.

David Krop has learned his lesson about leaving his laptop in his car. And he now uses remote tracking software. If you aren’t yet set up to track your laptop, check out our theft recovery products here.

The NY Times had put a great article this week entitled "On the Trail of the Missing Gadget." Of course, Absolute Software’s Computrace / LoJack products fall into this category of "missing gadgetry retrieval", so to speak. The article does a great job of generalizing how these technologies and services work, and how absolutely easy it is for the end user. The software just sits there until you need it – then we do all the work to help retrieve your missing gadget if it does go missing! Simple!

With the case of more advanced technology, like we employ at Absolute, the recovery is aided by services such as GPS, keystroke captures, or by internet connections to gather evidence and help determine where the lost device is being used. At Absolute, our recovery team also continues the process until the point when the device is recovered. This is by far the safest route, as you, the customer, never come in contact with the criminals. This also enables law enforcement agencies to prosecute those responsible for thefts.

John Livingston, CEO of Absolute, explains why:

"We will purposefully never reveal a location to a consumer customer. We won’t do it. Once you declare that it’s lost or stolen, we take control over the location at that point. We purposely keep some safe distance between the end user and the thief."

Absolute employs a team of 40 investigators with experience in law enforcement. This team then works closely with local law enforcement agencies to recover stolen devices. If you have sensitive data on your device, you have the option to trigger a remote delete of that data. We’re also working on a way to permanently disable the computers, which will hopefully be another deterrent to theft.

You can learn more about the Absolute recovery process here.

Absolute Software celebrated its new U.S. headquarters in Austin, Texas with an open house on July 16th! Absolute Software CEO, John Livingston, flew down to Austin to cut the symbolic red ribbon at the open house. Also with him in the photo below are Carter McCrary, COO of Absolute, and Rob Chase, CFO of Absolute:

Here’s another shot of the lobby of the new Austin, Texas U.S. Headquarters!

Absolute Software CEO John Livingston was recently interviewed by FOX Business. The interview follows the announcement that Absolute had opened a new U.S. headquarters in Austin, Texas. Despite reports of the economic downturn in the U.S., Absolute has plans to double the number of employees in the new U.S. office in the next 2 years!

Check out John on the “Small Business, Big Ideas” segment below:

Absolute Software became a Microsoft Gold Certified Partner back in 2007, a recognition that Absolute continues to demonstrate the highest level of proficiency with Microsoft-based technologies and aptly incorporates these technologies into its customer solutions. As a continued part of that alliance, Bill Hunka, Director of Business Development at Absolute, and Bill Gordon Director of Absolute’s Wireless team,  talk about our technology in a long interview here, and in a shorter review here:

Don’t forget, Computrace and LoJack for Laptops also work on the Mac!

Last month we announced that Absolute Software’s Computrace Mobile was nominated for a  Stevie Award for “New Product or Service of the Year – Software as a Service.” Computrace Mobile has now been selected as a Finalist for the awards!

During the month of preliminary judging, Absolute Software joins 11 other companies listed as finalists in this category. Final Stevie winners will be determined in the final judging that began this week. If you took the time to vote for Computrace Mobile, thanks!

The names of Stevie winners will be announced at the 2009 awards dinner and presentations in New York’s Marriott Marquis Hotel on Monday, June 22.

SBTV recently aired a segment about Absolute Software’s consumer laptop security suite, LoJack for Laptops. The video was made at CES 2009. The host, Mario Armstrong, describes how LoJack works and how important it is to think about protecting your technology devices.

Armstrong also points his viewers to Absolute’s Computrace product for corporate customers looking for even more laptop security solutions.

Ken Colburn (aka the Data Doctor) was on CNN a couple of weeks ago to give some simple advice on protecting your sensitive information if your computer is stolen. The most common mistakes people make that put data at risk on lost laptops, according to Ken, are: not set a password on the computer, auto-saving username and passwords, and leaving sensitive information unprotected by alternate passwords or encryption.

As you can see from the video below, Ken goes on to recommend software than can help make your computer more secure and/or recover it. He recommends LoJack for Laptops / Computrace, as well as other programs listed here.

Thanks Ken for the great coverage!

Also in the news: Microsoft will stop selling its Windows Live OneCare consumer security service and will re-release it as a free download by the end of 2009. They hope this will mean less malware. Speaking of malware, a new trojan came up a couple days ago that can send both Mac & PC users, even with patched software, to impostor websites. Ouch!