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What are you afraid of? Go ahead… share your fears with us! Are you afraid of the dark, or of heights! I promise no one will make fun of you for your fears, whatever they are. For me… I’d have to say fear of having my laptop stolen has to be my worst nightmare. I have a lot of data and information on there, and it would be a royal pain to try and straighten it all out again if I lost my machine somehow.Too bad there isn’t some type of free software that I can use… oh… wait… there IS!

Prey is not only free, it’s also open-source! Even better, it works on Windows, OS X, and even many flavors of Linux!! Prey is a lightweight application that will help you track and find your laptop if it ever gets stolen.

Prey helps you locate your missing laptop by sending timed reports with a ton of information about where it is at. This will include things like the status of the computer, a list of the programs that are running, what connections are active, network and wi-fi information, a screenshot of the desktop, and – if your laptop has a webcam built in – a picture of the thief!!

Prey uses a remote activation system. This means the program just sits silently on your machine until you want it to run. If you turn it on, it will gather all of the information and send it to your Prey web control panel – or directly to your Inbox. The thief will never know that you’re watching their every move!

I know that you may think a thief will simply reformat your laptop right away. However, that usually isn’t the case. In most instances, the thieves are looking for your information, not looking to get rid of it.

Prey has proven to be successful in capturing several different thieves, so what do you have to lose? It’s free, it runs on all operating systems, and it WORKS.

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Stolen Laptop Tracking

If you have a MacBook, you are likely protective of it. Notebooks are stolen every day, especially from college students. Would you like another layer of protection? TotalTechie from our live community sent in the following recommendation for all of us to try.

iAlertU is the ultimate free MacBook protection system. To activate and deactivate, you simply hold the menu button on your Apple Remote. This application runs in the background, so it doesn’t show up or interfere with you work, except for on the menu bar at the top of the screen.

So here’s the point. If anyone moves your MacBook, touches your keyboard, starts to close the screen, moves the Trackpad/mouse, unplugs the AC adapter, or unplugs any devices, an alarm goes off and a picture of the person is taken. The picture is sent through Mail.app to any specified email. Note that an account must be set up in Mail.app for this to work. This can be especially useful for college kids in dorms. People are always in and out of the dorms, and I know several people who had their MacBooks stolen.

Thanks to TotalTechie for this information that many of our readers may not have known. iAlertU is completely free, and can mean the difference between a stolen MacBook, and one that a potential thief runs away from.

How can You Protect Your MacBook?