Hello all, I am new to this community, but I have using a Macbook Pro since about 2015. I don't have a ton of experience with MacOS X on it, but quite a bit with Ubuntu Linux.
Unfortunately someone in my family forgot to flip the latch on the back sliding door one night almost a week ago now. The next morning, we noticed that the door was unlocked, but nothing really seemed to be missing and nobody had heard anything in the night. Felt almost too good to be true.
After about an hour of assuming that everything was fine, "have you seen my laptop?"
It was a super bummer!
Its a 2012 Macbook pro 10.1 running a dual boot with Ubuntu 19.10 as default, and MacOS 10.8 Mountain Lion as an alternate. A little old by today's standards, but running Linux, its rock solid. I barely ever used MacOS, but at least had set up "find my mac" when I first got it.
We have reported this to the police, and have spoken to Apple directly about it. Both of which have been extremely unhelpful.
While researching Macbooks back before I purchased it, I was particularly curious about their security features, being that we're talking about such an expensive device. So I went to the Apple store, and asked them specifically how "find my mac" works, and whether or not it would work if the laptop were running an alternative OS such as Linux or Windows, since I knew I would definitely be using one or both of those at least as a dual boot. The multi-OS compatibility was a big draw to this platform. They of course assured me that everything "find my mac" needs in order to function is hardware and firmware based, and that it will work regardless of what OS is running so long as the device connects to the internet. I then had them confirm this with several other employees, because I wanted to be extra sure, but they all claimed the same.
From what I can put together, what the Apple store told me sounds like an implementation of Intel's AT technology. My i7-3720qm does have AT if you look at the specs at Intel.
Here is the feature breakdown for Intel AT:
Looks about right, It claims that it works even when the disk is wiped with a new OS because its built into the chip.
upon further reading though, it appears Intel AT has not only been discontinued on all products made since 2015, but any current subscriptions(in 2015) had to be ended or they would be locked out of their device at end of term.
https://community.mcafee.com/t5/Ant...eft-Service-has-been-discontinued/td-p/368217
Now this is Mcaffee, which was acquired by Intel a while back, but the same seems to hold true for other providers:
support.norton.com
community.norton.com
Intel however is apparently no longer in the Anti-Theft business.
Unfortunately "find my mac" has been completely silent for almost a week now.
Now I get that it could be that it simply hasn't connected to a network yet, but seems extremely unlikely after this much time. According to the police, items like these, particularly those taken during home invasions, change hands almost immediately, and will continue to do so until someone ends up with it who has the skills to make use of it. Not that it would be hard, as Ubuntu was set to auto-boot to the desktop without credentials into a "guest" sort of account. I always figured if anyone ever took it I wanted to make sure they were easily able to connect to a wifi nearby. It also auto connects if an open wifi is present.
So issue real issue is, I need to find a fellow Macbook user who either runs Linux, or can try booting up their macbook with a Ubuntu(or other) live-drive. I need to know whether you are able to use the "find my mac" feature on your icloud account to locate your Macbook when running Linux/Ubuntu, assuming it is network connected.
If you need any help getting the livedrive to work with your particular hardware, I should be able to help. It was a little backwards getting the wifi device working on mine, but pretty simple still, just a few clicks in the right places. I am guessing newer devices hopefully may not have this issue.
Please if you have any information at all that would be of any help at all I would appreciate it so much!
All other outlets have failed me, this is my last straw.
Thank you all so much!
Unfortunately someone in my family forgot to flip the latch on the back sliding door one night almost a week ago now. The next morning, we noticed that the door was unlocked, but nothing really seemed to be missing and nobody had heard anything in the night. Felt almost too good to be true.
After about an hour of assuming that everything was fine, "have you seen my laptop?"
It was a super bummer!
Its a 2012 Macbook pro 10.1 running a dual boot with Ubuntu 19.10 as default, and MacOS 10.8 Mountain Lion as an alternate. A little old by today's standards, but running Linux, its rock solid. I barely ever used MacOS, but at least had set up "find my mac" when I first got it.
We have reported this to the police, and have spoken to Apple directly about it. Both of which have been extremely unhelpful.
While researching Macbooks back before I purchased it, I was particularly curious about their security features, being that we're talking about such an expensive device. So I went to the Apple store, and asked them specifically how "find my mac" works, and whether or not it would work if the laptop were running an alternative OS such as Linux or Windows, since I knew I would definitely be using one or both of those at least as a dual boot. The multi-OS compatibility was a big draw to this platform. They of course assured me that everything "find my mac" needs in order to function is hardware and firmware based, and that it will work regardless of what OS is running so long as the device connects to the internet. I then had them confirm this with several other employees, because I wanted to be extra sure, but they all claimed the same.
From what I can put together, what the Apple store told me sounds like an implementation of Intel's AT technology. My i7-3720qm does have AT if you look at the specs at Intel.
Here is the feature breakdown for Intel AT:
Looks about right, It claims that it works even when the disk is wiped with a new OS because its built into the chip.
upon further reading though, it appears Intel AT has not only been discontinued on all products made since 2015, but any current subscriptions(in 2015) had to be ended or they would be locked out of their device at end of term.
https://community.mcafee.com/t5/Ant...eft-Service-has-been-discontinued/td-p/368217
Now this is Mcaffee, which was acquired by Intel a while back, but the same seems to hold true for other providers:
Info: Withdrawal of Intel Anti-Theft service from Norton Anti-Theft portal
Important news about your Norton Anti-Theft subscription
Intel Anti-Theft - Need to deactivate it
Some time ago, when Norton Anti-Theft supported it, I activated Intel Anti-Theft. Now every week or so my laptop shuts down (losing all open docs etc) and when restarted I get the Intel Anti-Theft BIOS password screen. I still know the password, but obviously this is a big problem. As Norton...
Unfortunately "find my mac" has been completely silent for almost a week now.
Now I get that it could be that it simply hasn't connected to a network yet, but seems extremely unlikely after this much time. According to the police, items like these, particularly those taken during home invasions, change hands almost immediately, and will continue to do so until someone ends up with it who has the skills to make use of it. Not that it would be hard, as Ubuntu was set to auto-boot to the desktop without credentials into a "guest" sort of account. I always figured if anyone ever took it I wanted to make sure they were easily able to connect to a wifi nearby. It also auto connects if an open wifi is present.
So issue real issue is, I need to find a fellow Macbook user who either runs Linux, or can try booting up their macbook with a Ubuntu(or other) live-drive. I need to know whether you are able to use the "find my mac" feature on your icloud account to locate your Macbook when running Linux/Ubuntu, assuming it is network connected.
If you need any help getting the livedrive to work with your particular hardware, I should be able to help. It was a little backwards getting the wifi device working on mine, but pretty simple still, just a few clicks in the right places. I am guessing newer devices hopefully may not have this issue.
Please if you have any information at all that would be of any help at all I would appreciate it so much!
All other outlets have failed me, this is my last straw.
Thank you all so much!
