Find a stolen a computer?

Question

how do i find a stolen computer

Answer 1

I think the probability of finding the computer rises if you planned for the possibility of the computer being stolen. Then you could have installed some sort of protection. Examples of protection would be a program that checked a web site every time the computer is turned on. If the web site said the computer was stolen, then it would report the IP address where it was located.

Given you did nothing, the only electronic fingerprint that you can detect without actually posessing the computer is the MAC address on the wireless. If you know the MAC address, then you could war-drive the neighborhood where you thought the computer was. War driving is looking at all the wireless networks in the current area (and changing the area by driving). In essence you would be scanning the neighborhood for your MAC address on some wireless network. It wouldn't make any difference if the thief was using encryption on the wireless, because the MAC address is sent in the clear. If you found your MAC address, then you could contact the authorities.

Answer 2

It all depends, you can find a stolen computer by Finding the theif, Cause if some one connects to the internet on a stolen computer it wont connect to the same ip, You can find a hardware scanner, if you knew what hard ware it had, other than that im out of ideas.