How to Implement a Laptop Anti-Theft Program

Overview

As an IT professional, you probably suspect that your company loses a laptop occasionally. But if you actually tracked your laptops, you’d likely be much more alarmed. Research shows that the average company loses between ten and twenty percent of their laptops within their service lifetime. For a business with 1,000 laptops, this means up to 200 devices could go missing within three years, each potentially loaded with sensitive corporate data and applications.

If that number raised your eyebrows (and your stress level), you’re not alone — device loss is an issue plaguing IT professionals, CISOs, and MSPs across the globe. And it’s important to address this liability with a robust laptop anti-theft program to secure your organization’s equipment and protect sensitive business and customer data from unauthorized access.

In this guide, we’ll take a closer look at laptop anti-theft programs — what they are and why you’d want to implement one. We’ll also discuss how to implement a device anti-theft program, why you should have anti-theft software at the center of your program, and specific features you should look for.

What is a laptop anti-theft program?

An effective laptop anti-theft program is a comprehensive suite of measures, policies, and systems designed to protect your organization’s mobile assets. Specifically, it:

• Prevents laptop theftPreventive measures serve as the cornerstone of an anti-theft program. These can include anything from physical security devices – like a cable lock that secures the laptop to an immovable object – to visual deterrents like security stickers that discourage theft by indicating that the laptop can be tracked.
• Logs laptop activity and accessKeeping a close eye on usage – logging access attempts and tracking location through IP logging and user activity – creates an audit trail you can use to trace a laptop’s activity before and after a theft.
• Gives you options when theft occursA comprehensive program gives you tools for mitigating the damage and potentially recovering the asset: remote encryption of sensitive files, remote lock, a message displayed to whoever has the device, or automatic action when a laptop leaves a geofence.

Location tracking features can also help pinpoint a laptop’s position, assisting law enforcement in recovery efforts.

Reasons to implement a laptop anti-theft program

There are several important reasons to implement a laptop anti-theft program at your organization.

You’re losing more laptops than you think

There’s a good chance you’re completely underestimating the number of laptops your organization loses every year. You don’t know what you don’t know; until you measure the problem, you have no idea how big it really is. Companies lose, on average, between 10% and 20% of laptops in service. That number can be even higher if you:

• Have a highly mobile or remote workforce — common in home-based healthcare and field-based or site-based service providers.
• Have a large or variable contract workforce, like the construction or defense industry.

Your laptops can be used against you

The corporate laptop is a treasure trove of internal information, making it a favored target for cybercriminals of all stripes. In the wrong hands it becomes an extremely dangerous tool.

• Company documents and dataInternal reports, financial records, strategic plans, and confidential employee or customer information can be used for competitive espionage, sold on, or leveraged for phishing attacks.
• Employee login credentialsSaved usernames and passwords are the keys to the kingdom, giving attackers access to corporate networks, databases, and email accounts.
• URLs and IPs for corporate IT resourcesVPN profiles, server IPs, and intranet URLs help an attacker map your network infrastructure and identify vulnerabilities for targeted attacks.
• Saved passwordsA single compromised password vault can cascade into breaches across every cloud service your organization uses.

Deter theft before it happens

Studies have shown that the mere presence of a security camera is effective at deterring crime. Likewise, having a laptop anti-theft system in place can help deter cybercrime — and it surfaces near-miss incidents that show you where security needs to improve.

Disk encryption is not enough

Full disk encryption offers ample protection against the damage a third party can do if they find or steal a laptop. Without the necessary employee login credentials, they won’t be able to access the data.

But disk encryption is far less effective against internal theft, where the actors already have the keys. Given that 67% of laptop losses involve a former employee or contractor, it’s easy to see why encryption isn’t the one-size-fits-all solution it’s often made out to be.

You can’t afford a data breach

Your company’s most valuable asset is its reputation. A major data breach can decimate it in a matter of moments, damaging your brand irreparably — not to mention costing you thousands or millions of dollars to clean up after the dust settles.

Your boss expects it

The C-suite relies on IT to perform its duties while managing risk. They assume that monitoring, protecting, and locking down corporate laptops is one of your core tasks. And if you’re an MSP, your clients expect the same thing — they see laptop protection as a given.

How to implement a laptop anti-theft program

For the best results, take a defense-in-depth approach. Like a fortress with multiple rings of walls, your program should have several layers: physical protection, data and authentication protection, and laptop anti-theft software.

Physical protection

Physical protection is essential in safeguarding corporate laptops from theft and unauthorized access.

• Asset taggingPhysical barcode labels or metal plates clearly mark equipment as inventoried and monitored, and integrate with your asset management system so a missing item is noticed quickly.
• Physical locksCable locks secure devices to a stationary object in public or unattended areas. Thieves looking for easy targets tend to bypass anything that requires extra effort.
• Security camerasThe risk of being recorded makes thieves think twice, and footage helps identify perpetrators and weaknesses in your facilities.

Data and authentication protection

The second layer protects the data itself, and the credentials that unlock it.

• Disk encryptionData on the drive can only be decrypted with the correct key. Even if the drive is removed and placed in another device, it cannot be read.
• Strong passwords and MFAEncryption is only as strong as the authentication protecting the key. Multi-factor authentication significantly reduces the risk of unauthorized access even when a password is compromised.
• Brute force protectionAccount lockout policies or delay mechanisms after repeated failed logins effectively thwart brute force attacks.

Laptop anti-theft software

Those are defensive measures. Anti-theft software is where you go on offense: real-time insight, tools, and countermeasures to respond to any security incident — against outsiders and insiders alike.

Features to look for

As you evaluate laptop anti-theft software, make sure any vendor you consider offers the following.

• Laptop trackingTracking and monitoring using several methods – WiFi triangulation, GPS, cellular triangulation, and IP-geo databases – with login activity recorded and notifications for geofence violations or extended offline time.
• Full disk encryption managementNearly a third of data theft occurs at the hands of third parties. Insist on encryption management via OS-native BitLocker and FileVault, managed from a single console.
• Central backup of recovery keysCentralized management of recovery keys and certificates keeps your workflow moving – including helping users with forgotten passwords.
• Hardware lockdownLock out the boot loader with a custom lock screen, rendering the device unusable while promoting return of the equipment.
• Data lockdownSelectively encrypt files, folders, or file types with out-of-band encryption, reversible once the incident is resolved. Think of it as ransomware for the good guys.
• Triggers and presetsCountermeasures should be available on demand and automatable – firing when a laptop leaves a geofence, enters a restricted country, or fails to check in for a set period.

Around 70% of data theft occurs at the hands of insiders, such as terminated employees or contractors. Hardware and data lockdown protect against those insiders, against hackers who bypass OS authentication, and as a fallback for laptops that were never encrypted.

Conclusion

To meet the expectations of a modern IT organization, implementing a robust device anti-theft program isn’t an option; it’s a necessity. A multifaceted system prevents theft and arms you with the tools, intelligence, and insight to keep your devices — and the data they hold — safe.

You’ll lose fewer laptops, which makes protecting your organization’s reputation and bottom line easier. And if a threat does occur despite your best efforts, you’ll have a range of response options rather than being caught off guard. For the incident-response side of the picture, read our guide on Lost and Stolen Device Security for Businesses.

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