Does Findmymac work if the thief formats my hard drive?

[enferrari]

I had my MacBook Pro stolen from me and I'm scared that the thief will just swap hard drives or format mine and I wont be able to track it.
If he does format or swap can I still track it? What should I do!?!?
And how can I increase my chances of getting it back?

 

[mickpearcey]

Unfortunately not... when your HDD is wiped the software is wiped.

The only thing you can do is submit a police report and hope they recover it by chance.

I've read about people asking Apple to put it in their system as stolen detailing the serial with proof of purchase but I'm not 100% sure.

 

[enferrari]

Unfortunately not... when your HDD is wiped the software is wiped.

The only thing you can do is submit a police report and hope they recover it by chance.

I've read about people asking Apple to put it in their system as stolen detailing the serial with proof of purchase but I'm not 100% sure.

Ugh Apple wont do anything but I understand that it was my responsibility to keep my MacBook safe. I hope it turns up. WHY ME!! AHH

 

[Adamantoise]

Yup, reason why I think findmymac isn't that effective.

Chances of the thief covering his tracks to that extent are slim to none though, personally I would still be hopeful.

If a stole a Macbook Pro, my first order of business would be to shut it down and leave it off until I can swap out the hard drive. Most people leave their Wi-Fi on ... And even if the Macbook isn't connected to a network, its location can be found thanks to Google's IP-to-Location mapping.

If for whatever reason, you turned off Wi-Fi before your laptop got stolen, then you're SOL.

 

[enferrari]

Yup, reason why I think findmymac isn't that effective.

Chances of the thief covering his tracks to that extent are slim to none though, personally I would still be hopeful.

If a stole a Macbook Pro, my first order of business would be to shut it down and leave it off until I can swap out the hard drive. Most people leave their Wi-Fi on ... And even if the Macbook isn't connected to a network, its location can be found thanks to Google's IP-to-Location mapping.

If for whatever reason, you turned off Wi-Fi before your laptop got stolen, then you're SOL.

Well my wifi is on so I hope they're stupid enough to connect to the internet.

 

[Krazy Bill]

Well my wifi is on so I hope they're stupid enough to connect to the internet.

Strangely enough, most people will.

 

[iThinkergoiMac]

Strangely enough, most people will.

Because most people who steal a laptop are stealing because the opportunity is there. Most people who steal for that reason aren't exactly smart, especially when it comes to computers. It works in our favor, generally.

That being said, if I actually stole a computer, the first thing I'd do is format it and start spoofing my MAC address.

 

[andymac2210]

Because most people who steal a laptop are stealing because the opportunity is there. Most people who steal for that reason aren't exactly smart, especially when it comes to computers. It works in our favor, generally.

That being said, if I actually stole a computer, the first thing I'd do is format it and start spoofing my MAC address.

Why spoof the MAC address?

Chances are, even if you get a location on it, it'll be approximate.
And I can assure you, the police aren't going to execute a search warrant on 2 city blocks (is that what you call them in America?) because of a green circle on an iphone app.

 

[iThinkergoiMac]

Why spoof the MAC address?

Chances are, even if you get a location on it, it'll be approximate.
And I can assure you, the police aren't going to execute a search warrant on 2 city blocks (is that what you call them in America?) because of a green circle on an iphone app.

True, but what if you're on the same network as the person you stole it from? I'm sure this happens often enough on large college campuses. When you have 20,000 students, it doesn't really matter if you go to the same college.

 

[Ccrew]

Has anyone specifically tested to know if it's broken by a format with the machine running Lion?

Reason I say this is that I know Find My Mac makes use of the restore partition in Lion, it's actually broken if you delete that partition, but you have to go through convolutions to delete it. That may be overlooked by the casual thief that's just going to format the system partition and do a clean install. I haven't tested it but it's possible that it will still function post format.

 

[phyrexia]

Yup, reason why I think findmymac isn't that effective.

Chances of the thief covering his tracks to that extent are slim to none though, personally I would still be hopeful.

If a stole a Macbook Pro, my first order of business would be to shut it down and leave it off until I can swap out the hard drive. Most people leave their Wi-Fi on ... And even if the Macbook isn't connected to a network, its location can be found thanks to Google's IP-to-Location mapping.

If for whatever reason, you turned off Wi-Fi before your laptop got stolen, then you're SOL.

Please explain to me how one could locate a machine not connected to the internet using a service on the internet. I must be misunderstanding your premise.

 

[Takashi]

Yup, reason why I think findmymac isn't that effective.

Chances of the thief covering his tracks to that extent are slim to none though, personally I would still be hopeful.

If a stole a Macbook Pro, my first order of business would be to shut it down and leave it off until I can swap out the hard drive. Most people leave their Wi-Fi on ... And even if the Macbook isn't connected to a network, its location can be found thanks to Google's IP-to-Location mapping.

If for whatever reason, you turned off Wi-Fi before your laptop got stolen, then you're SOL.

You know, you do have to physically connect the computer to the internet (Via Cable or authorized WiFi access point) for "Find My mac" to work. Turning WiFi on w/o connecting to the internet will not work.

 

[SDAVE]

I highly recommend setting up a firmware password next time and also creating a standard user account without a password, so it would be easier for the thief to log in to the nearest wifi spot so you can catch them.

I use Undercover and it's a good way of keeping it safe. It's worth every penny.

From the stories that I've read about stealing Macs, it seems that thieves usually never pop out the drive and replace it, they usually just keep it in there and log in.

These thieves are usually not too sophisticated when it comes to computers, so they'll either sell it to someone because they can't log in or try to find a way to format it (hopefully you have a firmware password on to make things harder for the thief)