Q: keep Find My iPhone running even when I'm not searching for it
My macbook seems to have been stolen a few hours ago. I've been using the Find My iPhone service in iCloud. But the results are always that the mac is offline, so iCloud can't locate my mac. Okay, I understand that it can only be located when the computer is online. But, because I'm not checking ALL the time, I'm wondering if there is a way to turn this service on for a whole day or for several days at a time. So, in case the thieves go online while I'm not using this Find My iPhone service, then if I can keep this service on all the time for a day or for several days, it'll find my computer.
I understand that there are ways that a thief can get around these security measures. One is by turning off Find My Mac. Honestly, I don't even know that I ever turned it on. I have no recollection.
Now, I read in another thread that there is something that can be turned on / off in System Preferences. But it wasn't clear to me if that was the phone or the macbook. I don't remember seeing anything for this in System Preferences on the computer. And, if there is such a thing, I don't remember ever turning it on or off. I've got a mid-2013 model, with 10.10.2.
Also, I saw in a thread somewhere that someone had reported to some Apple center (iCloud?) that his macbook stolen, but didn't say where he'd reported it stolen. Where is this?
The place it was stolen is monitored by CCTV but have to wait until tomorrow morning to see the tape. I'm in Thailand. There are stories of Thais stealing things from foreigners. I've been here for 11 years and though I've sometimes left things in stupid places, this is the first time I've had something stolen. There've been times in the past when I thought something had gotten stolen, but it turned up later. This time ... ****. My whole life is on that computer. It's a good thing that just yesterday afternoon I backed up all my data.
Thanks.
I'm editing this a few minutes after I initially posted. Just went to the iCloud Find My iPhone service again. This time I noticed that there is a box I can check that says, "Notify me when found". I can choose to have a sound played. I clicked the box, and hopefully I'll get an email if the computer is located while I'm not on this (public) computer.
OS X Mavericks (10.9.1), Believe me: I have OS X 10.10.2!
Posted on May 19, 2015 7:41 AM
Right -- System Preferences on the Mac.
There isn't a way to tun Find My Mac on remotely.
It requires the user password to turn it off. even if the machine is awake an running and logged in to your user account, it will still ask for the user login password if someone wants to turn off Find My Mac. However on a Mac, unlike an iPhone or iPad, I think it is fairly easy for someone who knows what they are doing to defeat the Find My Mac feature in other ways.
If it was mine, I wouldn't be optimistic about seeing it again, sorry to say. Hope I am wrong.
This or the Mac OS & System Software community are as good a place as anywhere for this question.
Posted on May 20, 2015 6:12 AM