How can stolen laptops be traced

But keep in mind, both these methods are such that you need to implement from before such a mishap happens. The most effective and sometimes expensive way to help you track your lost or stolen laptop is to install a good tracking software on the device before you actually misplace it.

Also, the below mentioned softwares are something that you need to have on your laptop BEFORE an accident happens, not after! Absolute will allow users to remotely locate your laptop via WiFi geolocation. WiFi geolocation uses the WiFi Positioning System which is essentially a massive database of Wi-Fi access points to discover the last place s your laptop was connected to the internet.

Software that uses this technology is extremely handy when hoping to hunt down your laptop. The Basic version will help you locate, lock and delete sensitive information on your device. They have different plans for Education, Enterprise and Individuals. Their Personal Plan for individuals covers tracking 3 devices, and providing device security and data protection while their free plan only covers tracking down the devices.

HiddenApp helps individuals, families, businesses, and organisations keep their mobile devices, tablets and even laptops and the data they contain secure and recoverable in the event of loss and theft. For a business solution, we also recommend EXO5 —. There are a few more solutions out there that should be listed here but we will cover those more extensively at a later stage. Many people do not know this, but it is possible to track the IP address of your device through many popular apps and services like Gmail and Dropbox.

It is a unique indicator to your internet device that can be tracked and located. When you want to track your lost or stolen laptop, hunting down the various IP addresses it may access is the most straightforward way to do it. To track these sessions, simply go into the settings of your favourite, most frequently used sites from another laptop or device, and check the latest login sessions. If the robber has opened your laptop then the chances are your Dropbox has made an automatic sync if there is internet and your Gmail has refreshed to download new emails.

These sessions usually have IP addresses associated with them, which will help you find your lost or stolen laptop. Dropbox is great for this because it syncs your information in the background, so it is technically constantly logging in. Gmail is great if you are tracking a thief because they will often times scroll through your mail to find private information.

Facebook has a specific tab for login locations, which should make tracking your laptop that much easier from there. For added security, enable 2-factor authentication for your accounts. Typically, most people are always logged in to social media platforms and applications frequently used, such as Gmail, Facebook, iCloud, and Instagram.

This means anyone with your laptop has automatic access to these accounts. Fortunately, all the major platforms think Google, Apple, Amazon, Facebook, and the like allow you to log out of your accounts remotely. For example, you can log out of your Google account via another computer or your smartphone.

Now, do the same for your social media accounts. Next, deauthorize your laptop and remove it from your trusted device list for these platforms. Yes, GPS tracking works for missing laptops too. However, if it looks like you left it behind at the location, you can go with someone to check things out. Anyone who has access to these details can initiate unauthorized transactions via your accounts. Most banks have a hotline number or self-service channel for fast-tracking reports of stolen or missing devices.

Typically, the bank will freeze your debit and credit cards to prevent fraudulent activities. Once you file a formal report with your organization, they would have to protect any work-related information, monitor any work accounts, and reset their passwords. To see where it is, go to utilities and start the terminal app. It displays all the network interfaces along with their MAC address. A decent chance of recovery of your laptop is by contacting your network administrator.

But if you did register the device, getting in touch with the network administrator is necessary so that your laptop can be marked to be traced or for monitoring. This feature uses the operating system of your laptop and starts tracing its location from the day it gets missing. To track your laptop, you have to log in to the device with a Microsoft account from which your Find my device feature will start working.