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May 9, 2008

huh

Back to My Mac helps theft victim reclaim her Mac

Posted May. 9, ’08, 1:50 PM PT by David Dahlquist
Category | Apple » Huh?

criminal_justice_jurisprudence.jpg (JPEG Image, 1317x1458 pixels) - Scaled (32%).jpgWhoever says a .Mac account is a waste of money has probably never had his or her Mac stolen. In this admittedly rare case of a .Mac account actually being useful, a White Plains, NY woman whose apartment was burglarized and de-Macified in the process, was able to use the Back to My Mac feature to identify the culprit.

The 23 year old victim was first notified by her friend that her stolen Mac appeared to be online (I guess the genius thief didn’t think to log out of iChat?). This prompted her to sign on to her .Mac account through another computer and use the Back to My Mac program to determine that her computer was indeed online. She activated iPhoto and was able to get a snapshot of the thief, who her room mate recognized as “that sketchy dude from our party last week”. The photos went to the police, and justice was served.

I personally hope the thief is put away for life. I know it sounds like a harsh sentence, but when you think about it, some people’s lives are in their laptops, and so stealing a laptop is like stealing someone’s life. Therefore, laptop theft is equatable to murder, and convicted laptop thieves should thus receive life sentences for their abominable crimes (man, I’m going to make an awesome lawyer).


7 Comments

Anonymous said:

they should get a life sentence of having to use Windows!

May 9, 2008 3:12 PM
Andre Da Costa said:

You were being sarcastic when you say 'equate to murder' right?

I do agree what person did was wrong, and they do deserve jail time for it, but equating a Mac to human life is just...whack!

Anyway, I am glad everything worked out.

May 9, 2008 3:27 PM
David Dahlquist said:

*sigh*, yes, in case it wasn't obvious, I was indeed joking. I do not *really* believe that stealing a laptop is equatable to murder, nor do I think it warrants a life sentence. But seriously, stealing a laptop is a truly messed up thing to do. I shudder to think of losing my music collection, photos, recorded music, school work, etc., I like the idea of life sentence to Windows though.

May 9, 2008 3:47 PM
kenny said:

how stupid are the thieves, first thing they should have done was turn of sharing or reinstall the osx ...... they deserve to get caught for STUPIDITY

May 9, 2008 3:52 PM
Chris said:

So how do you take a photo of the theeif in iPhoto? Wouldn't the theif see that an application was open that was using the camera and wonder why all of a sudden the computer was controlling itself? If I were a theif (and I am not) I'd close the lid! Just wondering out loud....

May 9, 2008 4:22 PM
doc said:

how about treating spamming as a capital crime? bet everyone would be on board for that!

May 9, 2008 7:14 PM
bic parker said:

Signing in or out of iChat would not have made any difference on Back to My Mac. You can set your computer to sign into to .Mac independently (under the .Mac System Preferences) and have Back to My Mac when your computer is turned on. Likely, this is was the case with the laptop (as it is with my laptop and desktop).

Also, I think that the lady used PhotoBooth, not iPhoto, to capture the picture of the thief.

So, the thief's real ignorance was putting the laptop online in the first place.

May 10, 2008 8:02 PM

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