I really like the idea of placing monitoring software on your laptop with some password-less "guest" account to make it possible to track your laptop if it is stolen. An example of such monitoring software is Prey, though I'm sure there are others.
If you are security-conscious, you might already be using full-disk encryption, for example FileVault 2 for Macs, or either Microsoft's BitLocker or TrueCrypt. If you do, now there's a problem: A theft won't be able to boot your computer at all, thus won't be able to use your honeypot.
So, you have a choice to make. What would cost you more? That your data gets stolen, or that you can't recover the physical laptop? For most users, I'd say the latter, since you should already be using some kind of basic backup for your important information, and not store anything risky like credit card numbers or passwords unencrypted. But if you use your laptop for anything that has important "intellectual property value", especially work-related, I thing you're better off encrypting the whole drive and counting the laptop as a complete loss if it gets stole .
Published on July 15, 2012 at 21:16 EDT
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