From our SETI.Germany Blog:
Computer theft solved thanks to BOINC

The thief could not have anticipated this when stealing the iMac 27 of our member CR62! The stolen computer was running the BOINC software which does not only support scientific projects but, as it turns out, is also a useful anti theft protection installation.

The iMac which was stolen from the office around 3am on August 25th was already contacting the BOINC project WUProp the next day to transfer data. The thus copied IP address was given to the police who consequently applied for a search warrant and managed to secure the iMac by September 2th.

In response to the latest success of the BOINC project Einstein@Home where volunteers donate their unused computer time to search for pulsars and gravitational waves it should be said that:
Not only was a Pulsar found but now also an iMac!!

http://en.wikinews.org/wiki/Computer_theft_solved_thanks_to_BOINC

HA ... stupid theif! I've heard of this before ... score one for the "good guys"

I was hoping that I might be able to get an IP off my laptop that was recently stolen, but for one problem; on it I have a passworded user account and no guest access. Thus, the computer probably won't even get to the point where BOINC would connect to the internet. I'm sure it's been wiped and is for sale in some pawn shop by now.

On my future laptop, I will be using Prey and a guest account "just in case".

And you gotta wonder why the OS and Security software vendors have not picked up on this excellent idea to track down stolen computers. It's like lojack for laptops.

There is LoJack for laptops, as well as a bunch of other solutions... There is even an open-source one that allows you to track & monitor up to three computers for free. preyproject.org