Undercover 2.0 Giveaway
A few weeks ago, the great people over at Orbicule released Undercover 2.0. For those of you who don’t know and haven’t read our review, Undercover is a security tool that helps you recover your Mac if it is stolen.
Undercover 2.0 dramatically reduces its already low memory footprint by about 75% and also reduces its CPU and internet usage by only “calling home” when your network connection changes. They have also added a fail-safe by automatically putting your computer into “Plan B” hardware failure mode if it hasn’t connected to the internet for two months.
As a student, I run Undercover on my laptop and I recommend it to anyone who has a portable computer. If you are skeptical, you can read some recovery stories from Orbicule. Orbicule has kindly donated one Undercover household license ($59 value – allows you to protect up to 5 macs) for us to giveaway to one lucky reader. All you have to do is leave a comment answering the following question:
What are some features you would like to see in Undercover?
You have until December 3rd at 10AM EST to enter. One entry will be randomly selected to win the license we have to give away. Good luck and keep reading for more giveaways!
A video ( iChat like ) where the thief is displayed behind bars while the screen flashes yellow and a police siren blares!
A built in taser would be nice too!
Prevent access to keychain and other sensible private datas when computer is stolen.
automatically encrypt designated home directory when stolen.
The ability to send a command to the laptop to nuke the drive. So if you have to hope of getting your laptop back, you know that your information will be gone.
Cell phone integration: SMS warning!!!!
Since hard drives are easily replaceable by witty burglars … what about the feature that is able still send data to the undercover developers regardless of the HDD? Literally impossible without additional hardware
so..
being discreet enough that it wont be seen in the applications folder or activity monitor without massive computer hacking knowledge + not taking much resources.. bonus!!
I’d say having a tad more control on the stolen laptop so that I can at least try and get at least some of my data back. Sort of like a backdoor which gets activated only when the laptop is marked as stolen.
It should be great when laptop is stolen that it zip all home directory and send it to Orbicule’s server. So if you can’t re-gain your laptop you still have your data!
Well, seeing as this is probably mostly used for laptops, how about having it set the battery on fire when the sod who steals the laptop first turns it on. Hopefully, they will be using the laptop as intended (i.e. on their lap) and will from that point on be prevented from breeding. Not only do you get your (albeit slightly charred) mac back but you’re also cleansing the gene pool. Bargain!
It would be useful if Undercover could give the mac the ability to grow legs and run home, may not be possible, but worth looking into, well I think so
Wow, I looked at the recovery stories and they are indeed impressive. We have 1 iMac and 2 Laptops in our household and could not afford to replace them all if they were stolen, so 60 $ for the household license look like a wise investment.
I am a bit at a loss for features to request, since all you want from software like this is that it does what it does when you need it and doesn’t bother you in any way when you don’t. Reducing CPU usage is definitely part of this.
The company ensures that no data is sent back as long as the computer is not registered as stolen. However, the iSight shots of the thieves in the recovery stories did make me a bit nervous — if it can transmit shots of thieves, it could theoretically transmit shots of me; so privacy is a concern. I guess the only way is for them to build trust through their website.
Thanks for the hint!
How about starting “Plan B” after a week or as a user defined option. Waiting 2 months would seem like forever if my MBP was stolen.
How about an optional flashing message prerecorded that writes and screams, “YOU *fricken* JERK. I WILL *fricken* HUNT YOU DOWN TILL THE DAY YOU *fricken* DIE. GIVE ME MY *fricken* COMPUER BACK NOW.
Hope everything is well with you!
-Cheers!”
-(optional) change all user passwords to random #s and letters of which can be found by the owner on your site
-restrict thief to guest account
-remote hard drive erase (zeroing drive, not just a normal erase)
Thanks for this MacApper and Orbicule!
How about a “Backup to secure location” feature? The user could select a folder which would be zipped and s/ftped to a remote server when Undercover detected that the laptop had been stolen.
I think the ability to automatically backup critical info (of course, everyone should be doing this already) to a .Mac iDisk or Mozy could be a very useful addition. Also, the dimming screen feature is cool, but I wonder if it would be possible to simulate a kernel panic and make it even more likely for the laptop to go in for repair.
how about some sort of keylogger that is activated when the laptop gets stolen. Not sure if that can be programmed
Please randomly select me!
The ability to take your computer out of “Plan B” using either a password or access code.
1) A option to disable the function that assumes your laptop is stolen if it hasn’t got internet for 2 months.
2) Have some kind of control center which you can install on another computer. In this control panel you should be able to get information back and see (real-time) what that person is doing(if connected to the internet).
3) Data encryption when stolen. So that the thief can’t access passwords and personal information.
I think it would be nice if there was a way so I can access my files online if the thief were to go online. Some of my work can be just as valuable as my MacBook itself. Perhaps Orbicule can mirror the harddisk onto their servers and then delete all non-vital files so my data is protected, 7 pass deletion?!
Like the comment mentioned above, a mobile phone notification via SMS message would be nice. That can drammatically cut the time for the owner of the notebook to notify the Orbicule headquarters about the theft. That early notification can definitely increase the chances of catching the snake, IMO.
I think a feature that automatically locks down the Mac and encrypts the HD at the same time might be interesting.
Maybe even using filevault?
By the way for all those who are interested I have currently my own giveaway contest for a license of Remote Buddy going.
If you’re interested drop by at my blog (Days of our Macbooks);)
Any feature that automatically locks down the computer. Whether this be remotely triggered after you KNOW it has been stolen, or time-delayed of some sorts.
Many good ideas here. I agree with the idea of making a backup of data .. but people should be doing this already and not waiting until their laptop is stolen to get a backup. Keylogging might be nice, especially if it could grab usernames and passwords that the thief had used online. Would help police track down more info on their other nefarious activities. But again, we’d need to be confident that our own typing isn’t being tracked.
It would give the owner a better feeling if, when we activate the service saying our computer has been stolen, we can log in and get updates on what Orbicule has found, including a map showing area the Mac is located in (via ip address lookup). Would just give more comfort to see a glowing target showing approx. area the mac was last located at!
I like the iSight & screen cap features, as well as the IP address tracking. I agree with others, recovery of data would be huge. I’ve had a computer stolen (by my office’s “security guard” no less) many years ago, and since my backup was out of date it really set my project back. How about making sure that any eBay postings from my computer get sent to me.
Maybe make the computer behave like Vista after being stolen? Enable “UAC” like requests for indentity and go into full-blown resource hogging mode?
For an extra fee have “undercover+” or alike where you can have a GPS chip installed onto the machine. If James Bond is a good source of information, they’re damn small: you could easily hide one under the battery.
I have current back-ups so for me the worry is personal info being accessed by the thief.
You cannot boot, wake from sleep, or start after screen-saver without typing my password in.
I imagine it is most likely that your machine will be stolen to be sold ASAP. If it is quickly disabled it will need some tech intervention which will take time and trouble, so maybe the thief will chuck it in a dumpster and go for an easier target.
I would like to see the machine go “dead” after 5 unsuccessful tries at typing in the password. Prior to “going dead” send me an e-mail with the thief’s picture and display it on the screen as a Wanted Poster.
It would also be nice if the owner had a way of “disabling” the disable in case your buddy’s were trying to break in while you were going to the washroom.
I am also going to instal this on my iMac because it is basically a portable that only needs a plug. Very easily stolen from your home.
Undercover would be better if it came integrated with some program like iAlertU that would let off a siren, or call your cellphone, or take pictures whenever the laptop is moved.
I think a good feature for Undercover would allow the owner of the stolen laptop to see what was going on with their stolen laptop from another laptop or computer. Or, if Undercover would automatically send a police report and the owner would have to confirm the report.
I would like to see fake a failing hard drive. I could make spoof errors and make the horrid clicking noise signaling HDD failure. Eventually, it will act like it cannot boot by showing an error message at boot (of course, you can get rid of the message with a secret hotkey).
The should be a feature where if the laptop or computer is recovered by the police, they can insert a preprogrammed USB drive (which would only be distributed to law enforcement) that would then decode and display contact information that would enable them to return the computer to its owner. The contact information could be the owner’s, or the company’s plus a unique code that they could use to identify the owner. In the latter case they should call back the law enforcement agency on a listed number, to make sure it’s not the crook pretending to be the cops.
I do realize the one drawback of this, it only works where the cops are honest and where the legal system doesn’t require them to hold onto the computer until it is obsolete!
Well, it took me a while to think of a cool new feature but maybe video or audio recording. It could use the built in iSight to record and send audio and video to the people trying to recover the computer. Also text messaging updates would be pretty sweet.
Have Undercover automatically encrypt your HDD with FileVault and lock it with a password that the user pre-sets when they install the program, so that the thief can’t access the information.
It could self-destruct like in the Bond movies.
Some way to encrypt your home folder when the computer is detected as stolen would be nice and also a way for the users to access the data that has been collected from a stolen computer.
Other than that, this product is pretty perfect.
I know some may have ethical concerns, but I would like some sort of key logging/tracking service. So if someone steals your laptop and starts using it online, the input they create would be sent to Orbicule to help better track who/where they are. After all, they stole the laptop!
I like the backup feature others’ have suggested several times above, but that would be too much data to transfer. One could keep several hundred GBs in their home folder. We really need a way to backup important information – like the Docs folder, etc. Or, have a way to log into some sort of Orbicule management area available for customers (only activated when stolen), and request a backup of whichever folders/files are important (with a MAX # of GBs of course…).
I am a registered Undercover 2 user and I have to say I love it. I’m a little disappointed by the comments, as it’s clear that most people recognize that the contest winner is chosen randomly so just post whatever comes to mind (it seems like no one is reading this entry’s comments as all of the comments are rated zero when they are normally rated up or down. I would like to give my suggestions some serious thought, however, as I’m sure the developer is keeping his eye on these comments. If I happen to win, I’ll donate my license to a Mac friend.
That being said, Undercover 2 is basically perfect. And they have an educational discount, better yet. I reflected for five to ten minutes trying to think of ways to improve it and I could only come up with this: movie and audio recording. Video codecs are fast and efficient these days so movies could be recorded and uploaded without giving off fishy network activity. Audio would be great too. Orbicule uses the photos to work with the police and often times get warrants into the thieves’ homes. Video would capture a person’s quirks and audio could get their voice, two things which would be crucial in cases where the pictures aren’t enough.
I tried to tinker with Undercover on my system just to see how unbreakable it is. I’m not a programmer but every time I killed the Undercover process, it came right back up.
Most of the comments suggest things that are unnecessary. Follow Orbicule’s suggestion and password protect your accounts sans a password-free guest account that will entice a thief and thus capture him or her and hopefully get some photos. Enable the firmware password so that a thief can’t reinstall OS X and wipe your drive. Finally, enable the screen saver password so that if your laptop is stolen when you are asleep, the thief won’t get admin access. Finally, consider enabling FileVault.
To the user who suggested SMS messaging… what exactly do you mean? You report your computer as stolen to Orbicule. Undercover constantly checks with their servers for your computer’s status (stolen or not stolen). The check takes up so few kilobytes that I don’t even notice it when I monitor my outgoing connections. If their servers have your computer flagged as stolen, which only happens after you tell Orbicule, then Undercover kicks in and snaps pics, captures IPs, grabs screenshots, and eventually fakes a hardware failure urging the thief to take the computer to an Apple Store for a free repair where an Apple employee will secure your laptop for you.
A suggestion is to have Undercover try to connect to all wireless networks silently in an attempt to see which IPs the laptop is assigned to better estimate the location. This would come in handy if there are multiple wireless networks in range from different ISPs.
All that being said, I second the ideas of a user-defined plan B countdown and keystroke logging which would often time give details as to the thief’s location and identity. I look forward to a 2.x update to see what goodies the developers add. Orbicule’s support was great when I was on the fence about purchasing. They answered all of my questions in a timely manner and after many an email I was sure that this would be a great product for me. Check out their site and read the recovery stories!
I would like a feature that backs up your data to an external source (on the internet) and then erases all sensitive data on the drive.
I would also like a real-time tracking feature (with a google-maps like interface) to track where you laptop is whenever it connects to the internet.
The feature currently existent in iAlertU of taking a snapshot of the thief and emailing it to you. thanks!
I’d love to see an option for hourly email updates on the status of your computer if stolen.
I would like to see a similar iAlertU like feature in Undercover so that I can set the alarm when I walk away or perhaps after a set amount of time that replaces the password protected screen saver option, so that if it is disturbed except for a specific command/password it will set off the audible alarm and start snapping pictures, video, audio, etc. I would definitely add audio and/or video capture. I would also recommend a keylogging feature to capture more data about the thief, and any methods to better pin point the location of the laptop. I would recommend if not already doing so, to allow the customer to see what data is being captured to help with the privacy issue, plus see where the laptop is (or last) located. I sure if the undercover is able to communicate with Orbicle when on the Internet that you could pass commands to perform other functions that might be helpful as well. How about prompting them with a website saying they have won an iPhone or something in an attempt to get them to enter personal information and submit it or take them through some sort of fake set up process to try to gather information about them.
Yeah, scammers are always trying to phish info out of us, why not come up with ways to try to phish information out of the thieves and get them to slip up and tell on themselves. Most thieves are not very smart.
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In addition to what it already does, why not:
Randomly close the various ports…. sometime no keyboard functions, sometime no mouse, sometime no USB or Firewire, randomly resetting with every reset. And al the while searching for a signal to send it’s IP.
It isn’t clear, but if the laptop has a wireless card, why doesn’t Undercover “sniff” for a network of any strength, and send its uc signal?
Why not have the laptop do this at regular intervals even in standby or sleep modes? Even a thief may wander into the range of a WiFi spot.
And, also, why not have the ability to detect unauthorized remote log-ins, or other “remote control” procedures?
Obviously, there are many uses for something that did this…. and responded by encrypting the drive and/or sending a “Killall” or “kill network” signal immediately. A clearly readable of the relevant logs would help, also.
A “permissive access” setting for those of us who use remote desktop apps would be necessary.
I would love to see a few features to this amazing program!
Firstly, SMS ability to txt info to your cell would be great. Secondly, it would be great if the program popped up an official-looking box asking to ‘Confirm password for keychain’ or something like that. If they get it wrong, it still accepts it, but then it backs up and encrypts designated sensitive information, like passwords, bank info, etc, to a secret folder.
And at the same time deleting all internet information; cache, history, etc. Or backing it up to the same folder. Either way, just making sure that secure info is out of the grasp of the thief while Undercover does its magic.
Now I know this last bit is probably a little out there, but it would be nice if there was some way to keep the thief from deleting anything. Like secretly copying and backing up the files, and making them look like they’re deleted. Or something like that.
I really do love this program though! My sisters and myself are all in college and we would all feel safer with Undercover.
Ironically enough, my sister’s boyfriend who’s currently living in England had his MBP stolen in blackest London. This was a couple months before Undercover made its debut, which is a pity. Does Undercover work in countries outside of the US? Like cooperating with law enforcement, etc?
I’ve been following this software for a little while now and my first Mac gets delivered this week!!
Anyway – I love the SMS alerts.
My idea however may or may not be possible. Much in the same way the screen is disabled, could Undercover some how lock down all ports, usb, firewire etc to prevent them being used. Likewise prevent the CD being used, either spitting back out any CD put in the draw or simply not allowing access to it.
It would be a great way to prevent the data being stolen and could make the user think its a worthless dead laptop, in turn either selling it quickly or taking it back to a store for repair. Of course the latter may not happen.
Thoughts?
CS
#1 – Undercover could keep a database of files the user marks as important, so that if the laptop is marked as stolen, only essential files are in some way recovered (email, etc).
#2 – It would be good if a user could choose from a list of Hardware Simulations to be used in Plan B mode, examples: The inbuilt keyboard and mouse stop working, The USB ports stop working, The laptop won’t charge.
#3 – Once the laptop has been marked as stolen, Undercover could either use a fake environment or make the theif obscure to important personal files (either hand-chosen by the user, by file type, or everything).
#4 – I know this has been mentioned, but I know that if I had my MacBook Pro stolen, I would want a photo of the theif emailed to me.
Thanks for the good read.
- Snapser
On the presumption that most users have their Macs set to log in automatically on their main ID: Undercover should, when it knows its host computer has been stolen, turn on the Account log-in panel, in text entry mode (no list, just blanks for log-in and password). Then turn on FileVault on the Home folder with a password retained on Orbicule’s server. Then log out of whatever account is logged in.
- Give the original owner remote access to the computer.
- Encrypt the password so only the owner can see it.
- No use of the keyboard/trackpad/mouse
I’m also for the phone sms idea!
I like the e-mail updates and the encryption.
Undercover seems like a wonderful application.
One addition that would help out is a user-chosen time frame to go into Plan B. In two months, the thief could half sold it to another person, who in turn sold it again. At this point, the person bringing the laptop in would hardly know that the system would have been stolen.
In addition to the IP logger, a data logger might also be of good use. Outgoing packets sent by the thief could be logged in order to identify the person who stole the laptop, and, in case it was sold, the original thief would be the one caught instead of some poor sap who happened to by the Mac in person or online.
would be great if it had the ability to automatically lock you hard drive so that thieves cant reinstall the OS. A “stolen property” message on the desktop would be a good idea to lessen the attractiveness of a resale
I don’t THINK this is already in the product (it’s been a while since I tried it)….
How about gathering information about other machines on whatever network the thief hooks to. This could give more specific insight into location in some cases. Just names of machines would be fine, as scanning them for services/ports could set off some alarms if the thief is knowledgeable enough to have security measures on their network. There are many times that knowing the names of other machines on a network can narrow down a search from saying the person is in XYZ organization’s network to saying the person is in UVW Building of XYZ organization’s network.
This is a brilliant idea, and a terrific way to harness OS X in the name of security. I’m not rich, my Mac cost me a pretty penny, this software would be worth it for the peace of mind alone. And if the Mac does get stolen, it would suddenly be the best money I ever spent. (Unless I win the free license…)
free ice cream sundaes? in all seriousness, i guess constant ip mapping sort of like a gps, but by ip so that they wouldnt need a report from the owner, but rather would contact the owner (like credit card companies with identity theft) if they see something suspicious. looks like a good product already tho.
As far as I understand it, the Plan B seems to be lacking. If a user’s laptop has not been stolen but he/she is overseas working where there is no internet, won’t Plan B initiate? Also, if it is really stolen, and Plan B initiates, I think most thieves would be smart enough to not bring it into an Apple store. It’s okay if it is sold, but some thieves may just throw it away! Away in a garbage dump, it would never be detected. I’m not sure how, but maybe an in-built tracker that is not dependent on the internet?
Also, I think that while the HDD can be protected from erasure via a firmware passwd, would it still work if the HDD was replaced? I think a chip on the motherboard is the way to go.
Otherwise, really nice software.
Kurt
\”…These companies use engineering that can recover your lost data over ninety six percent of the time…\”
I’d like the App to trick your Mac into thinking it’s a Dell, therefore causing the batteries to burst and leak acid all over the thief or set him on fire.
An unsilenceable, blaring alarm.
I think a way to temporarily scramble passwords and hide all important accounts as soon as reported stolen. So like, it will hide all of my accounts and then display a random fake one that works well enough to get details on the person.
I would like to more random problems introduced when alarm is raised!
right, so I know i already went, but i just had another idea
most time when people steal computers, they don’t just try to hock it right away. they look around for credit card numbers, autosaved login names, etc.
the thief might not be dumb enough to go online, but they would definitely look for credit card numbers. and passwords.
if the computer realizes it’s being stolen (or maybe always) they could put a text file called “importantinfo.txt” on the desktop or documents or someplace the theif would look.
then when the cc # inside the file is used, Undercover is reported of activity.
you could make a fake login pages to use the fake username and passwords provided like some random small federal credit union (there’s thousands of them) that lets you “transfer funds”.
better yet, a fake porno site that the thief will undoubtedly check out cause he thinks it is harmless.
example:
Credit Card:
John Doe
1600 Pennsylvania Ave.
Washington, D.C.
1234-5689-1234-5689
Exp: 02/09 CCV: 339
Checking and Savings:
http://www.mafcu.org (or just put the name so it’s not TOO obvious)
Account name: Johnnyd
Password: blablkasjd
Checking #: 210931029412
http://www.nakedcoeds247.com
username: johnpub
password: pornaddict