Lost Laptop is no more

LOST LAPTOP, the, er, entrepreneurial website that we took to our hearts, is no more.

We couldn't quite believe the site's premise when it launched. People who found laptops could send the unit in to the firm and collect a reward, while people who lost laptops could pay the firm to get them back. Yeah, that was the bit that got us interested too.

Lost Laptop said that when a laptop was handed in it was assessed in terms of its make, model, condition, and its contents. Once these had been evaluated, a value was attached to the unit. This value was used to work out both the reward for the finder and the price the firm would charge to release the unit to the loser. The fact that a monetary value was put on the contents of the hard drive might have been of some concern to forgetful enterprise users, so we sought to clarify what was actually going on.

The firm claimed to have many satisfied customers, but we were concerned that it might have been breaching privacy and other rules, not to mention the fact that the general premise seemed to raise certain, ahem, moral questions. In addition, the outfit was exposing private documents on some of the units, including CVs, and um, nude photos.

We spoke to the Information Commissioners Office earlier this month about the website, and it released the following statement, "We are concerned at the existence of a website that appears to be trading in individuals' lost or stolen laptops, particularly the fact that it is making the content of each laptop, which in some cases may include personal information, available to anyone browsing the site. Any organisation processing personal data must notify with the ICO as a data controller and ensure that adequate safeguards are in place to keep that information safe and secure. This is an important principle of the Act. We will be making enquiries into the company behind the website before deciding what appropriate action, if any, to take."

This morning, following our discovery that the firm's web site was drawing a 403 error, we asked the ICO if there was an update, but it, like us, just repeated the above message, with the addition, "The website owners appear to have closed the page down of their own accord."

An email to the person responsible for the company's PR confirmed this. "John King has taken his project offline, because he was contacted by some authorities and wants to avoid costly trouble. John will check and maybe restart his project in the new year when his position is clarified", it said. µ