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We put a lot of trust in big companies, so when they let us down it can have serious consequences.
I recently went shopping for a new computer. I wanted a low-end laptop for light work, and the HP Stream seemed like a good deal. That deal was made even sweeter when Best Buy offered to sell me a returned one for almost 20 percent off. The salesman assured me that it was in like-new condition and that they would honor all warranties. Sold.
I always get a little thrill opening a new gadget. The computer looked like it had never been touched and all the paperwork was still in sealed bags. There was even a slip of paper in the box with the ID of the tech who cleaned and certified the unit.
So it surprised me when I booted up and saw someone else's name and Hotmail address at the login prompt. So much for like-new!
As I stared at the full name and e-mail address of the previous owner—let's call him David—I wondered. Could I get into this computer another way? It was mine after all. And how much more could I learn about him? How bad of a mistake had the store made?
Any similar stories out there Soylentils care to share?
Original Submission
(Score: 5, Informative) by Geotti on Saturday June 13 2015, @08:28PM
Netboot DBAN [wikipedia.org] before you resell a laptop, or at least run through regular system recovery. D'oh, Best Buy!
(Score: 2) by AnonTechie on Saturday June 13 2015, @09:07PM
Good advice ...
Albert Einstein - "Only two things are infinite, the universe and human stupidity, and I'm not sure about the former."
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday June 14 2015, @11:01PM
Even better advice: smash the mother-lovin' shit out of your hard drive with a big hammer before selling (the rest of) the laptop to anyone. Or use a nail gun. Just sayin'.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday June 13 2015, @10:33PM
http://www.amazon.com/Strongest-Neodymium-CMS-Magnetics%C2%AE-1-Count/dp/B008D3NRX8/ [ amazon.com (Warning: Unicode in URL) ]
Then take the hard drive apart and look at whats inside. There is a tiny crystal worth inspecting.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday June 13 2015, @10:36PM
I actually tried to remove all the crap amazon puts into links. I have no idea why that warning is important, but I apologize if it causes an issue.
(Score: 2) by hendrikboom on Sunday June 14 2015, @01:20AM
The Unicode character seems to be a registered-trademark symbol: ®
(Score: 2) by maxwell demon on Sunday June 14 2015, @08:43AM
The URL doesn't actually contain Unicode, but ASCII characters which decode to Unicode. The only system which needs to know how to handle them is the web server; any other system can just treat them as the sequence of ASCII characters it is. That's the whole point of the ASCII encoding of Unicode characters in URLs: It allows systems which have no idea about how to handle Unicode still correctly handle the URL. Indeed, you could enter this URL into a browser from the last millennium, and it would work quite fine (well, except that the browser might not be able to handle other aspects of HTTP which changed over time, and almost certainly would not be able to correctly display the resulting page).
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
(Score: 2) by Tork on Sunday June 14 2015, @04:48AM
🏳️🌈 Proud Ally 🏳️🌈 - Give us ribbiti or make us croak! 🐸
(Score: 2) by maxwell demon on Sunday June 14 2015, @08:53AM
Even if that user had used TrueCrypt, and had used a super-strong password instead of an easily cracked one, it still would not have helped, given that that his password got delivered with the computer. The best encryption doesn't help against someone who has your password.
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
(Score: 2) by Tork on Sunday June 14 2015, @02:16PM
🏳️🌈 Proud Ally 🏳️🌈 - Give us ribbiti or make us croak! 🐸
(Score: 2) by maxwell demon on Sunday June 14 2015, @03:34PM
RTFA, then you know.
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
(Score: 2) by Tork on Sunday June 14 2015, @06:41PM
🏳️🌈 Proud Ally 🏳️🌈 - Give us ribbiti or make us croak! 🐸
(Score: 5, Interesting) by Ethanol-fueled on Saturday June 13 2015, @08:58PM
Sometime in the early-mid 2000's I was working for a company who had been awarded a contract to do warranty repair for Best Buy. This was back during the XP era when the vast majority of home users were unaware of the "hidden" Administrator account with no password by default which could grant access to anywhere in the system. I never downloaded anything from anybody's computer but I liked to search for something like "*.jpg" and see what popped up, and I would actively poke around a user's files when I got bored. In one customer's computer I found a bunch of camwhore pics in a folder adjacent to the documentation of her custody battle with a saved note that said something like, "Yeah, he's trying to say I'm a slut. Can you believe that?" Fortunately I never saw anything I had to report and anyway, what I did was nothing compared to what some of the Geek Squad and other guys did.
This was shortly after Best Buy had bought the Geek Squad. The idea was to have us handle the stuff that the Geek Squad couldn't -- which scarily enough were often things like OS reinstalls and malware removal. The more frightening part was how we repaired the hardware, though. We literally had a big garbage bin full of laptops which we used to spare parts for repairs. Need a new keyboard, aw, this one's not exact but close enough. Need a new bezel or clamshell, eh, this one's a slightly different color but close enough. There were huge secondary piles of used and yanked CPUs and RAM sticks of dubious quality from which to pick. Strip out a screw thread? Screw won't stay in? It will after some super-glue.
Of course I am more mature now and don't fix PCs for a living, so if I were in a situation where I bought a laptop which had user information I would simply wipe the drive and get on with life without trying to poke and prod. And what would I find in there anyway, insignificant minutiae about the life of somebody I don't give a fuck about? A shitty music collection full of whiny effeminate crypto-Christian bullshit like Bruno Mars or Kings of Leon? Naked pictures, as if I don't know what naked people look like? or the possibility that I would be put between a rock and a hard place for discovering something I would be compelled to report and have to deal with a shitload of police paperwork after forfeiting my new laptop?
Nah, not worth it. My life ain't that pathetic.
(Score: 2) by GungnirSniper on Saturday June 13 2015, @09:58PM
I've got what's perhaps a different situation. The local computer repair shop I once worked at had ancient, ancient hard disks left over. One of them, a small IDE drive of around 20MB, I took home. I later plugged it into a test box here, and almost immediately my AV identified and removed a boot sector virus. It looks like it was running MS-DOS 2.0, and has a number of old letters and documents on it. There's no identification or repair shop identification on the drive itself, but I have thought of returning the data to the drive's prior owners. I suspect though, that the best thing to do would be to go via the shop's owner (still the same guy) and have him return the data.
Tips for better submissions to help our site grow. [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday June 13 2015, @11:13PM
I know there is lost data from some of my old disks I really wish I could recover.
For average people who lost it through 'average' problems, it is often a huge boon.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday June 13 2015, @11:29PM
I used to work at a small computer shop. Back in 2008, we had a guy come in who was a cop. He was trading in his old computer, and we bought the hardware on the condition that we would destroy the old hard drives, because they had some old police evidence on them, and simply erasing wouldn't do the job.
The manager agreed, the guy left happy with our agreement.
The owner (not the manager) then on-sold the hard drives to someone else, claiming that it was his right to do so.
Never, ever trust someone to fulfill an agreement like that.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by frojack on Sunday June 14 2015, @04:33AM
In my Ex-Day-job, we were occasionally asked to analyze hard drives for the Police.
They were from seized computers, and this was before there were standard forensics software packs available.
Arrive in a sealed bag, chain of custody signature tags and the whole thing.
(Got the job because of personal friend of D.A, and assistant chief, in a small town).
One drive they were looking for child porn, - non found even in erased sectors. lots of pics of the guys wife, ahem,,,
Another they were looking for erased documents, - embezzlement case, found plenty, and the guy also had a BSDM fetish and the pics to prove it.
Back then, you could jumper drives for write protect, which we always did, before mounting the drive under linux. (Any change after the date it was seized can be challenged by a knowledgeable lawyer).
You can't always do any more. Some drives don't have write protect jumpers any more. These days you often need a special harness [sharkoon.com] to disconnect the write circuit, and even that can't prevent all changes on some drives.
Other than that it was a revolting job, and I'm glad we got out of it.
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: 3, Funny) by bradley13 on Sunday June 14 2015, @05:50AM
Chain of custody? Evidence tags? Nah...
Back in the dark ages, when I was a college student visiting family, one of the in-laws was a Secret Service agent. They had a case of credit-card fraud, and had a computer that they thought contained a bunch of stolen credit-card information. I needed to find it, extract and format it and print it out. So he asked me if I could help. So he sat me in an office with the computer; I fiddled, found the data, wrote a program to decode and sort it (it wasn't encrypted or anything) - all of this directly on that computer.
Being a naive 19 or 20 year old, it didn't occur to me what a absolute idiocy that was, I mean, I was all flattered and working for the Secret Service, gee, golly whiz. Given that I wasn't even a CS major at the time, and just programmed for a hobby, it's a miracle I didn't destroy the data by accident.
Everyone is somebody else's weirdo.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday June 13 2015, @10:05PM
I bought a $600 HP Special Edition Laptop from Amazon, it was listed as new, the seller was Amazon and not a third party. I open the box, turn it on, and it presents a logon screen for someone named Bruce. I was pissed off. Amazon offered a refund of $160 if I wanted to keep it, which I did, all I had to do was wipe/reinstall the O.S. from the hidden partition and it worked fine. I tried writing an Amazon review about this, but like most negative reviews it got rejected.
(Score: 2) by GungnirSniper on Saturday June 13 2015, @10:19PM
Well you did take their $160, which means they pre-emptively addressed your complaint. So I don't see you having grounds to complain about your review getting rejected when they already handed you back money, which you accepted.
Tips for better submissions to help our site grow. [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 1) by Bill Evans on Saturday June 13 2015, @11:12PM
Well, no. The purpose of a negative review is not revenge, but to warn others. If he got $160, that doesn't lessen the need to warn others.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday June 13 2015, @11:17PM
Did you eat paint chips as a kid? Advertising it as new then sending something obviously used is bait and switch. Amazons review system is biased towards more sales. I've had reviews accepted but later redacted because of complaints from the third party seller. Truth in reviews is frowned on when it's negative, even though it's to warn others.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by GungnirSniper on Saturday June 13 2015, @10:14PM
They say stereotypes aren't accurate, but it in this case, it was. This completely sub-height, sub-soaped, early-40s humanoid came into the repair shop for something trivial. I think his HP tower needed a new CD-RW drive. We took it in and worked on it later. When I installed the new drive, I wanted to test it would work properly with a full pile of data. Normally, I'd backup My Docs, My Pics, or MP3s, but he didn't have enough of that to cover 100MB. Since he had file sharing software like Bearshare or Kazaa installed, I looked for movie files. And what I found was grotesque: two young girls, preschool-age, in a hottub being encouraged to give a tug to the fully-erect penis of the videographer.
I told the owner, and was quite clear I wanted to call the police. He knew the creeper humanoid, and verified what I saw for himself before dialing. The local cop, a man from an earlier age, didn't understand computers, but took the machine and had the guy arrested. That cop later told us the guy was given a slap on the wrist by the local liberal judge and that was it. I don't know if he got his computer back from the police, but we never saw him again.
Tips for better submissions to help our site grow. [soylentnews.org]
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday June 14 2015, @01:24AM
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What a touching story. And you are right, the stereotypical meddler gloves fit you just right. You've got it all, including the apparent blindness to your own filthiness and hypocrisy.
Let's recount. You betrayed the customer's trust, which was a breach of both personal and professional ethics in this case, and rummaged through his files, when creating your own temp file would have been totally sufficient. You unearthed some seemingly illegal video (not that you could verify its legality in any meaningful way). You watched what you thought were some youngsters being molested in a tub. Then, instead of talking to authorities directly, you shared this self-proclaimed smut with another employee. Then you ratted the guy out. You did this all while having zero evidence of the guy obtaining or having seen the movie. You, on the other hand, did actively seek private movie files, and have seen the movie. Prima facie, you are the bloody pedo. I don't think pedofilia is unethical, but you obviously do, right? I am not even going to start on the whole depiction versus child abuse issue here, but if you indeed found file-sharing apps, then the movie was likely a non-commercial copy, and so the whole incident did not hurt anyone, and you could as well be reporting drawn manga.
You are also a very lucky guy, because the usual practice is to shoot the messenger, along with everyone else who came in contact with thoughtcrime videos. If I were you, I would not be so concerned with your customer being let free; instead, I would be thanking my numerous gods for not landing in a big house myself.
~Anonymous 0x9932FE2729B1D963
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(Score: 5, Touché) by Runaway1956 on Sunday June 14 2015, @02:28AM
Well, hello there, sub-height, sub-soaped, early-40s humanoid.
“Take me to the Brig. I want to see the “real Marines”. – Major General Chesty Puller, USMC
(Score: 2) by Gravis on Sunday June 14 2015, @08:16AM
I told the owner, and was quite clear I wanted to call the police.
you should have called the FBI as they are the ones that deal with this type of twisted shit.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Anal Pumpernickel on Sunday June 14 2015, @01:22PM
What's twisted is that certain arrangements of bits are illegal, and the fact that someone (not necessarily the owner of the computer) possibly molested a child. But instead of going after people who take harmful actions, we've chosen to go after people who possess videos or images. A good use of resources, clearly, and completely constitutional as well.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday June 15 2015, @06:47PM
Mom, punish him! He's thinking bad thoughts!
(Score: 3, Interesting) by GungnirSniper on Saturday June 13 2015, @10:30PM
The repair shop I was at was near a big-name crimson college, and it wasn't unusual to see computers with Chinese or other non-Latin characters on the keyboards. What did not match in this case, was the language of the keyboard and Windows with the owner's name. The obviously Middle Eastern name did not match at all with the very Oriental nature of the kanji and brand name Panasonic. It wasn't a Toughbook but a stylish almost-Sony-like imported thin notebook. Somehow I accessed the files, and found the real owner's name and contact info. He was so incredibly grateful, since his master's thesis was on there, to know he hadn't lost it forever.
The police later arrested the theft, who apparently was an opportunistic type who struck dorms while delivering pizzas.
Tips for better submissions to help our site grow. [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 2) by MichaelDavidCrawford on Sunday June 14 2015, @12:20AM
their objective is to get electronics back into productive use. They only recycle them if they can't do so.
They don't always know to wipe the drives.
Yes I Have No Bananas. [gofundme.com]
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Sunday June 14 2015, @02:24AM
I had used computers, and had plenty of exposure to them. But, I never could afford to own one. Or more accurately, I COULD HAVE owned my own computer, but there were to many other things that seemed more important to me.
I stopped at an estate sale one day, and there was a computer sitting there. Sweet old lady told me that she would take fifty bucks for it. I asked about passwords, manuals, etc. She handed me a box of stuff that went with the computer. I gave her the money, carried all the components and the box of stuff to the car.
At home, the computer booted up - but no way, no how, could I find a password to get past the boot screen. No Post-It note on the monitor, no scribbled passwords in the manuals, nothing. Boot to floppy instead, and start exploring. All these years later, I can't even remember what I used to get the password, but I finally got it, along with all the data the old guy had on there. It was all personal stuff, with some useful technical. I backed up the technical stuff, and when I was sure there was nothing else useful, I wiped all the dead man's personal stuff.
“Take me to the Brig. I want to see the “real Marines”. – Major General Chesty Puller, USMC
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday June 14 2015, @03:30AM
Some guy runs l0phtcrack and suddenly he's all blackhatted and c00L? Oh, I get it. This isn't news. This is just an excuse for the rest of you pathetic shits to jizz all over the comments section to prove how l33t YOU are. Fuck all you morons.
(Score: 2, Interesting) by necrophage on Sunday June 14 2015, @03:31AM
A long time ago I bought a used tape drive with some extra tapes. After installing the device I found some data still on the tapes. They were secret Intel emails about the testing of a 486 pentium for laptops. The files were even marked "Secret." There was a lot of technical data about pin ### and the Voltage was wrong and what they were going to do to change it etc. There were pictures of the tech that had tapes, with his family and a lot of Star Trek sound effects wave files. Gave quite an insight about testing new hardware for Intel.
(Score: 2) by Geotti on Sunday June 14 2015, @01:09PM
a 486 pentium
Huh?
(Score: 2) by VLM on Sunday June 14 2015, @09:44PM
One of these probably early 90s anecdotal story:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pentium_OverDrive [wikipedia.org]
I had a cousin of this chip, that put a fast 486 in a 386 socket.
This general kind of thing has been around since the 80s. V20 or V30 or something was a faster pin compatible 8088 "IBM XT" and there was a hitachi chip compatible with a 6809 that added some nifty features.
Obviously this didn't help the memory IO speed, but it usually did wonders for on-chip cache performance and on-chip FPU performance etc.
Obviously these gadgets work better with "intel style" architecture where even a NOP instruction takes like 47 clock cycles to process. On a "motorola style" architecture where everything is RISCy and takes like one clock cycle per instruction the payoff is minimal.