Martin Wainwright The Guardian, Wednesday February 20 2008

A British company has patented a hi-tech version of the cash boxes which squirt dye or shoot out telescopic poles - in the form of laptop software which photographs the thief, pinpoints his or her whereabouts and quietly destroys sensitive data.

The system has been tested in Yorkshire following the recent spate of high-profile cases involving government laptops taken home or left in staff members' cars against regulations.

A programme available on licence for £10 a month links to a control centre, which takes action if a laptop is used outside designated areas such as a government office or even a specific employee's desk.

Once connected to the internet, which with the latest generation laptops would happen automatically when switched on, the computer takes repeated pictures of its surroundings while sending out its location to the control centre.

"We guarantee to monitor the state and whereabouts of any laptop's electronic 'heartbeat', and to trigger the destruction of any files in the case of unauthorised, or apparently unauthorised, use," said Dean Bates of Virtuity, the Sheffield-based IT firm which has devised the scheme.

"There are millions of laptops out there containing valuable data. Most of them are not stolen because of that, but it's an obvious attraction if the thief wants to sell the computer on to more serious criminals."

The BackStopp programme is claimed to be undetectable to thieves, both when sending identification data and while wiping sensitive files. With the new generation of laptops, which use mobile phones' GSM (Global System for Mobile communications), the mechanisms would be in action as soon as a laptop left a room - even in the stairwell as a thief escaped from someone's home or office.

Spotted here