prey-0.5.1-win.exe

Has anyone heard of or had any experience with this program? I ran across it in Bill Mullins blog. As I am considering purchasing a laptop for my grandson I downloaded it but when I checked the file with VirusTotal there was 6 or so malware found. As always I appreciate all replies and would thank you in advance.

John

 

what's the md5 hash and where did you download the .exe from?

 

I remember reading about Prey in a respectable computer magazine and googling it afterwards because it sounded interesting. Therefore I assume it's a legitimate program. I'm not surprised it triggered virus alterts because from what I understand it basically acts as a trojan spy-tool (to spy on the laptop thief and send you info).

I'm curious to hear people's experience with the program. I didn't end up installing it myself because I felt the expected benefit (i.e. chance that my laptop is stolen and that Prey works to help recover it intact times the value of the laptop and convenience of keeping it) were outweighed by the potential annoyance of having an active process always running in the background listening for a trigger signal. Plus it would be unlikely to protect me against the real danger anyway; privacy theft.

I backup my computer at least weekly (with snapshot, acronis, or similar), and my work files daily (with dropbox), so even if my computer were stolen, the lost data would not be a problem per se. What would be a problem is if the thief could recover information about my passwords, bank accounts, etc. I've encrypted my desktops with TrueCrypt, and need to do the same with my laptop, but haven't taken the plunge yet as full system encryption has its inconveniences -- but once I do a program like Prey will be moot since the thief won't be able to access my hard drive (without reformatting), let alone boot my system.

 

Gentlemen thank you for your replies.

acr1965,

After seeing the VirusTotal results I deleted the file. Thought it better to see if any forum members had any experience with the program. I downloaded it from the Bill Mullins Blog. However I have at times had the same experience with files he recommends, according to VirusTotal, containing malware. I decided that according to feedback that I could always download the program from Prey.

pajenn,

The laptop I would purchase would be for my 13 year old grandson. I am more concerned with recovery than loss of information. At that age he sometimes can be very forgetful.

Again thanks,

John