Nothing can give you sleepless nights more than your laptop disappearing at the internet cafe. Sure, you can buy the latest one- but it’s the data that matters. If you’re the average bloke, chances are that little notebook of yours holds not just lovenotes and a secret porn stash, but also financial documents, credit card cookies and a masterfile full of your passwords. That’s what the thieves salivate over. Not the cheap laptop housing it.
“But I got encryption!”
Ha. Double Ha. Visit security forums and you’ll discover how miscreants find it so easy to steal encryption keys that products like Vista’s Bitlocker relies on. Encrytion confounds the garden variety hacker- but not the determined corporate raider. Good thing there’s a better solution now.
Imagine how nice it would be if information could just self-destruct when your laptop meanders away from a secure location. Poof! There goes the data- and a very vexed thief to go with it.
Virtuity proposes the exact solution with a service called BackStopp. The way it works is simple. The hosted service follows laptops using internet connection or wif-fi and GPRS. If the device owner sends an urgent message, or if the unit transfers outside a secure location, Backstop issues commands that wirelessly blanks out the drive.
Some savvy thieves may attempt to disable wi-fi or cellular connections but there’s yet another failsafe. Backstopp deploys RFID (radio frequency tags) to trigger a last ditch call to delete critical data. How’s that for extreme? Once the data is secure, the webcam goes online and snaps a few shot- hopefully taking capturing the malefactor’s ugly mug and broadcasting it to the police.
Think you’ll invest?
