Security firm Virtuity has announced a new solution called Backstopp, which will help government departments avoid data theft and catch criminals.

The solution responds to the growing number of lost and stolen laptops by government departments by constantly monitoring the electronic “heartbeat” of a laptop to determine its location.

If a user’s laptop is moved from its authorised area, the software self destruct’s the laptop’s data and uses wireless communication to locate the laptop. When a laptop contains built in webcam, a picture of the thief will automatically be taken when they open the laptop and uploaded to any network as soon as it becomes available.
Dave Brooker, Virtuity's managing director, said “A lot of people are putting their faith in encryption which is OK, but in reality if a company or government department loses a laptop can they be absolutely sure that the user followed all the encryption procedures or that the thief will not be technically sophisticated and motivated enough to break the code?”

“Often encryption relies on a dongle or other external device,” Brooker added. “As often as not this device is stored in the same laptop case as the laptop so the thief just needs to plug it in.”

Brooker said his firm is currently discussing the £10 a laptop per month solution with a number of government bodies. Brooker believes Backstopp is a more attractive solution than the solution Gordon Brown has put in place, forbidding all civil servants from removing laptops from government offices.

“The organisation that lost the laptop receives a report through GSM infrastructure detailing exactly what data was deleted and when,” explained Brooker. “In the case of the MoD recently, the Minister for Defence, could have simply told the mass media there was no compromise of data and could have produced the report to prove it.”