Intel plans to brick stolen laptops

By Nick Mansell on Wed 02 April 2008

The ability to brick stolen mobiles by blocking their IMEI numbers has made expensive phones much less attractive to thieves. Sadly, laptops are still high on their shopping lists, with often little more than a car window between them and a lucrative snatch. Now, though, Intel's doing something about it. It's announced its Anti-Theft Technology - or ATT - initiative that could effectively do for the laptop what IMEI blocking has done for mobiles.

Intel's Mobility Group chief, Dadi Perlmutter, has been giving an overview of how it could work. Boot up an ATT protected laptop without authorisation and it could automatically lock down the hard drive, and possibly even the processor, making both the data safe, and the laptop unusable, even if the hard drive is replaced.

The technology could even go one step further with Tracker-style GPS monitoring to pin-point exactly where the laptop's been taken.

Intel says it'll have more to sow us in Q4 - around November time. With Fujitsu Siemens, Lenovo and PC security firm, McAfee already on board, we could see the first anti-theft laptops by Christmas.

[The Register]