Undercover: Like LoJack For Your Mac
Posted by Fraser on 06/21/07 in Applications, Home & Personal, Utilities
Undercover, by Orbicule, is an ‘app’ which would certainly help if the unthinkable happened: your beloved Mac gets stolen. Once installed, you will never hear from Undercover again. It does nothing, it doesn’t interrupt with anything and its processes don’t show. This isn’t what you may have expected, but it’s the way Orbicule plans to retrieve your Mac in a very ‘Think Different’ fashion.
Firstly, you do have to start the recovery process, either by calling them up, or mailing them, or by filling in a form on their website. They start out by attempting to log the current IP address, as well as other network information to precisely pin-point the location of your Mac; screenshots are also taken if you’ve got an integrated iSight. Here’s a real shot of a thief using it:
If the first step doesn’t locate your Mac, they don’t just give up and stop there. Nope, they take it to the next level by faking a hardware problem. The screen gradually dims over a 30 minute period, and will remain black after that. In most cases, this will then urge the thief to either sell the Mac or take it for repair, increasing the chances of its recovery.
All this while, screenshots are periodically being sent back to Orbicule for monitoring. But if you think someone can just wipe the disk and get rid of everything, think again. Orbicule recommends, and has a tutorial on their website on how to set the firmware password, which prevents unauthorized erasure of the disk. This is probably something everyone should do, not just those who have bought Undercover.
On the whole, the guys at Orbicule have done a great job at making this so easy to use, and discreet after installation. Undercover is actually a root process; it will phone home even if the thief cannot log in. According to the company, of the 2.2% of Orbicule Macs that were stolen in 2006, 72% of these connected to the Internet. And of that 72%, 96% were recovered.
This certainly makes you think how valuable a tool it is. 2.2% is quite a high figure, considering MOST people with Undercover installed are probably quite security-conscious anyway. Look forward to Leopard support, two major new features and a free upgrade that seems to be in the works.
If you think you cannot live without it, Undercover is available from Orbicule, and costs just $39, with NO subscription fee (another nice little feature).
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