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12,000 Laptops Lost Weekly At Airports
Posted by
timothy
on Thu Jul 03, 2008 05:02 PM
from the dignity-lost-even-more-often dept.
from the dignity-lost-even-more-often dept.
kthejoker writes "Apparently companies are even worse about losing our data than we suspected. From the article: 'According to a study of 106 major US airports and 800 business travelers published by the Ponemon Institute and Dell Computer, about 12,000 laptops are lost in airports each week. Only 30 percent of travelers ever recover the lost devices. Nearly half of the travelers say their laptops contain customer data or confidential business information.' Kinda scary..."
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Insurance (Score:5, Insightful)
Perhaps they should have purchased insurance? .
After all, the workers know not to steal the ones with the insurance stickers.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Insurance (Score:5, Funny)
You've obviously never lost a company laptop... They definitely care and can show it by giving you an "off the shelf replacement" which turns out to actually be a Kaypro luggable ;)
I've observed a similar thing with replacement Blackberrys...
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Ditto... how the eff do you forget your laptop? Phone, maybe I can buy - the holster broke, it slipped out my pocket in the cab...
But a freakin' laptop? Me thinks someone just wants a new one and doesn't want to wait until the lease is up.
Re:Insurance (Score:4, Informative)
Ditto... how the eff do you forget your laptop? Phone, maybe I can buy - the holster broke, it slipped out my pocket in the cab...
One place I worked at for a while, in France, was in an industrial estate. They'd carefully secured everything with magic keycard entry and security, and were very careful about letting laptops out of the building. I eventually got permission to travel with my laptop on the basis that I was spending weeks at a time off at the R&D centre several hundred miles away, and got a habit of taking it home in the evenings as well. I mention this because I walked in with my laptop one Tuesday morning and discovered that over the previous night, somebody had walked in and stolen every single laptop from the building. For a while I was the only person with a laptop...
So yeah. Laptops are tempting targets and do tend to 'disappear', so some of these 'forgetfulness' issues may actually be assisted by larceny. I find it a little inexplicable that so many people actually lose them in the literal sense, but I suppose it's not all that difficult. If for example you've been from say Austin to say Milwaukee via Memphis and Chicago, and upon exiting the airport you're lugging around a small suitcase, a cabin bag, two plastic bags containing duty-free and a bottle of water to replace the one confiscated at the airport respectively, and a laptop bag, then it seems not beyond the realms of plausibility that you might inadvertently leave something behind in the taxi. This only gets worse with really long-haul flights, which often leave you disgustingly overtired and dehydrated and generally incapable of counting your own shoes, assuming you remembered to retrieve them from the X-ray machine on your way through, let alone the number of items of luggage you have on you and whether you packed your laptop in the briefcase or just carried it around the airport in its metrosexual little neoprene sock.
I have no explanation for the number of idiots who lose laptops on trains in the UK, other than to say that if you make it through a trip from Penzance to Glasgow with your soul intact, let alone your luggage, you are already doing pretty well.
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Look at who sponsered the 'study' (Score:5, Insightful)
Really, let's look at who sponsored this study... Dell, and what do they have to gain from having businesses think that their laptops are all going to be lost?
Why, insurance from them obviously. They do have very good lost/accidental insurance cover (which I got on my current laptop because work paid for it)... but it costs money, and obviously makes them money overall.
So, take these results with a monstrous rock of salt.
Parent
Re:Sponsor laptop theft study=laptop vendor? wow! (Score:3, Interesting)
So Dell's primary business is selling laptop insurance?
I don't think so...
OTOH -- if that stolen laptop is from Dell -- better make sure you never call up for support on it.
Dunno about other laptop vendors, but Dell's been getting keeping close track of machines purchased by companies -- what company owns them, who is calling on their behalf...etc.
If all laptop vendors did that, it seems it might drop the worth of stolen laptops, since they are not notoriously reliable and long-lived.
OK, so I'm looking at the actual report now... (Score:5, Informative)
It's here [dell.com]
First up:
"Laptop loss frequencies were collected from a confidential field survey as either a direct weekly estimate or as a range variable as reported by airport officials. Exact loss frequencies were typically not calculated or available for review."
It's all just averages using methods that are vague.
Then... 22% of these lost in the major airports are recovered before the flight... (15% in the minor) but they include all of these laptops that were lost for a number of minutes.
Then there are 9% (Major) and 20% (Minor) that are recovered after the flight.
Come on, we're talking most likely badly taken figures in the first place, and then including laptops that aren't really lost at all.
Parent
Re:Look at who sponsered the 'study' (Score:5, Insightful)
Really? While I understand the nature of conflict of interest, on the spectrum of things that are open to interpretation, this one seems closer to "fact" than "opinion". You walk into an airport with a laptop, you walk out without one, boom... you're one of the 12,000.
Sometimes facts are facts regardless of who's spouting them. If I told you the next new Moon was August 1, would you "take that with a monstrous rock of salt" because I was in the outdoor evening lighting business?
I believe the conflict of interest was spelled out pretty clearly in TFA: "Dell used the report to support its launch of Dell ProSupport Mobility Services"
Your analogy is pretty bad, you're talking about a binary event that we not only know to the day, but to the second. The study was done by sampling, and oh btw, if you read the study it does not say "about 12,000", it says "up to 12,000". A proper analogy there would be: Human beings grow to up to 8ft 11in [guinnessworldrecords.com] in height. I'm sure you can see how a company presenting that as typical needs to be taken with a monstrous rock of salt.
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Indeed. It's like a car insurance company that tells you that you can save UP TO 15% by switching to them. That doesn't imply you'll save anything.
10 laptops satisfies the "up to 12,000" figure.
Also, keep in mind that the figure is rather useless unless you compare it to the number of laptops taken successfully through airports. 12,000 might sound high if you think of 12,000 travellers, but is rather low if it tuns out to equate to a 0.01% risk.
All in all, this is slashvertising at its best. Don't give
Re:Look at who sponsered the 'study' (Score:4, Informative)
You walk into an airport with a laptop, you walk out without one, boom... you're one of the 12,000.
Riiiight. And how exactly does that happen? It magically vaporizes from your carryon? When exactly is that? My carryon never leaves my person, and thus my laptop never leaves my person...except for when it's going thru the metal detector. If my laptop disappeared in that machine, they'd have to pry me away from that machine with a crowbar. And I can't even come close to fathoming that happening 12,000 times per week. Thus, I call serious shenanigans on this 12,000/week claim. And as a result of that, I likewise call shenanigans on your simple "boom" acceptance that this is actually occurring.
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Always use protection (Score:5, Insightful)
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Someone has to be sued first. No excuse these days.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
Truecrypt along with Debian, Fedora, by extension Ubuntu are not solutions an enterprise can deploy reliably.
Truecrypt is mighty close but portability is a killer for any enterprise to manage.
Picture the scenario where a user changed the keys and then gets fired. With Truecrypt hopefully you have a copy of the master key so you should be fine. With encrypted LVM solutions things can get all kinds of hairy though.
I wish Truecrypt supported fingerprint authentication. Right now it looks like Computrace's L
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
This raises important questions (Score:5, Funny)
...Why do they keep giving these 800 people laptops if they're each losing over 12 per week?
Re:This raises important questions (Score:5, Funny)
That poor woman...
Parent
Re: (Score:2)
Unless they're flying almost constantly, that means they're actually losing several per flight.
"I can't believe it. I lost another three laptops today!"
Math (Score:5, Insightful)
Where the hell are the 40,000 unrecovered laptops a year going? Is there really that much of a market for used (stolen) laptops?
Re: (Score:2)
www.ebay.com (Score:5, Funny)
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Miniscule (Score:5, Informative)
But still, what kind of moron loses their laptop while traveling? I can't imagine letting it out of my sight or even out of my reach.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
You know, you put your stuff on the belt, walk through the detector, and they ask you to step aside for special screening without giving you a chance to collect your stuff. Or the detector beeps, and they need to ask you to step aside so they can check you with a wand. And all the while this is happening there is a crowd of people between you and your stuff. You can't see it. You can't tell the TSA agent to let you go so you can keep an eye on your stuff.
It is a miracle I have never lost anything at during
Re:Miniscule (Score:4, Insightful)
But still, what kind of moron loses their laptop while traveling? I can't imagine letting it out of my sight or even out of my reach.
It doesn't take a moron. It takes someone who's momentarily distracted, tired, or asleep.
I could say it takes an uncompassionate git to make such a sweeping statement with no regard for the wide variety of circumstances under which people that travel.
Parent
Re:Miniscule (Score:5, Interesting)
And from my own personal experience it is frustrating trying to communicate with the baggage complaint desk person (could there be a worse job?) because the airline doesn't consider them lost, only delayed, and they are sure to remind you of that throughout the conversation.
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Lost? Insurance scam more likely (Score:5, Interesting)
My experience working in a hotel...
Business person (men and women) leave laptop in hotel room. Contact said person to return it.
"Oh, no, don't send it back - it's a year old - I claim on insurance and get a new, faster, better laptop. You can have it."
I can't help thinking an airport is a better place to "upgrade" your laptop - none of those pesky hotel staff trying to return it to you.
huh? (Score:2, Insightful)
This story is bunk. It does not pass the sniff test.
600,000 laptops a year just floating around in thieves hands.. I don't buy it..
Bad science.. bad study.
The story doesn't say how many are recovered before the laptop loser leaves the building. it is probably 90%. I can live with 60,000 a year stolen.. but 600k.. blah.
Pokemon Institute (Score:5, Funny)
They're missing because I caught them all!
208000 laptops per year... (Score:5, Interesting)
You know... that comes out to about 1004000 laptops every five years.
If we could only get airport personnel to increase their "output" we could scrap that pointless One Laptop Per Child project.
Those things cost money.
These would be like... for free.
Re:208000 laptops per year... (Score:5, Funny)
I get it 12,000 laptops per week times 17 1/3 weeks per year means 208,000 laptops per year.
208,000 laptops per year times 4.8269231 years means 1,004,000 laptops in five years.
What are you on? Glue?
Parent
In unrelated news... (Score:4, Insightful)
According to a study [...] published by the Ponemon Institute and Dell Computer, about 12,000 laptops are lost in airports each week. Only 30 percent of travelers ever recover the lost devices. Nearly half of the travelers say their laptops contain customer data or confidential business information.
In what I'm sure is completely unrelated news, the release of this report coincides with Dell releasing a new service - Dell Mobility Services Aim To Protect Notebook Data [crn.com], and New Dell Services Help Users Hunt Down Missing Laptops [investors.com].
Relieved upon reading the article... (Score:3, Insightful)
When I travel with a laptop, I make sure it's my only carry-on. I store extras in the front and inner pockets of the laptop bag. You're less likley to lose something if you've only got 1 thing to remember.
Re:Relieved upon reading the article... (Score:4, Insightful)
I can't imagine anyone checking a laptop. Carry on definitely the way to go. Watch a movie while you're at it.
Parent
Just for clarification... (Score:2)
I recommend checking eBay.
Hard To Believe (Score:5, Insightful)
This number of lost laptops in airports is pretty hard to believe. Worldwide laptop production is like what, 60 million units? This article seems to be telling us that one percent of all the laptops made every year in the whole entire world are lost in U.S. airports.
It's a pretty big number given all the other ways a laptop can meet its end. Where are they all going? Is there some kind of giant warehouse somewhere?
No wonder mobile sector of the computer industry is booming.
Seems a little high (Score:5, Insightful)
12,000 / 106 = avg 113 laptops / airport / week.
Seems a little high. The pdf doesn't mention what was counted in "lost/stolen" laptops. Do they count every time someone couldn't find their baggage on the belt and reported it (and it just so happened they had a laptop)?
Only thing the pdf says about it is this:
The article does say though that the study was sponsored by Dell supporting its ProSupport Mobility whatever. It claims that Ponemon conducted it independently.
Either way, encrypt your laptops, and try to setup RDC or somesuch, so you can prevent sensitive data from being cached. But encryption should stop casual thieves 99% of the time. I assume Dell's stuff they're selling [dell.com] is meant to wait until someone accesses the internet with a stolen laptop and try to track it that way. But shouldn't the top priority be to prevent data from being accessed in the first place?
What's more important? The data or the hardware cost?
I rent a laptop when I get there (Score:5, Insightful)
and VPN into my network here. (In defense, I keep NICE toys up here. Stuff the client doesn't need to know about.)
The client picks up the cost and I don't carry anything when I travel.
The safest place to keep my data is right at home.
When the job is over I wipe the drive anyway, hand it back to the rental place and catch a flight back.
Re:I rent a laptop when I get there (Score:5, Funny)
Parent
You know you live in a decadent country when... (Score:5, Insightful)
"Los Angeles's LAX reported more laptop losses than any other airport, about 1,200 per week. Most of the airports said they generally keep the laptops for some period of times, then destroy them if they are unclaimed."
Destroy perfectly good computers??? Why??? Just destroy the drive, at most. Come on, how stupid can you get? Put them in schools, give them out to students, sell them to another country, but for Pete's sake don't throw them on landfills.
Re:You know you live in a decadent country when... (Score:4, Insightful)
They're destroyed to remove the conflict of interest/incentive for empoyees in charge of returning them. Whether that's perceived or actual...who knows. I'll bet they're not all destroyed though. I bet there's some corruption somewhere and someone who sees the waste and decides "I'll have that then".
Parent
Common sense (Score:4, Interesting)
I never let my laptop out of my sight anywhere - as has been said, prevention is better than a cure. Do not check it in, take it on as hand luggage. If security wants to check your machine to prove it's not a cleverly disguised stick of dynamite, watch them. Keep an eye on your luggage, and if you see someone opening up a bag and helping themselves to its contents, take a picture with your mobile phone or equivalent: otherwise, it'll be your word against the baggage handler's.
Another thing that tends to stop the machine getting lost/stolen is to take it around in a bag that is not specifically a 'laptop' bag. I stick my Eee PC into my bag, a fabric satchel, and while it does mean that cables get a bit tangled up, everything is safe and it's less likely to draw thieves' attention to it. It also has the added advantage of being able to wrap it around your ankle, so if someone tries to pinch it, you'll feel it tugging against your leg.
How do you forget a laptop? (Score:4, Insightful)
Not me... (Score:4, Funny)
http://www.xkcd.com/178/ [xkcd.com]
Parent