Can Computrace spread?

[dwilsonfl]

I have several old Thinkpads that I use at school. All were either donated, bought off the forum, or off ebay. I swap hard drives when one goes down. Apparently one had computrace and now the one I swapped the HD into is displaying a screen that I have to call some company "Amerisys?" because it's stolen. These are 10 year old laptops at least. Any way to deal with this other than trashing them?

TIA

David

[ajkula66]

Do you get the Computrace warning when you press F1 to access BIOS?

[RealBlackStuff]

Computrace is run by absolute.com, not amerisys.
Something stinks here...

[HelloKitty61]

OP have you tried restoring latest bios using bootable CD-R method?

[RealBlackStuff]

Computrace info is stored in an EEPROM, not in the BIOS.
The BIOS only shows options how to (de)activate it.
So replacing/updating the BIOS has no effect whatsoever.

Computrace does NOT transfer from one computer to another (unless you swap motherboards).

[dwilsonfl]

Might be related to this http://www.tomsguide.com/answers/id-314 ... trace.html

[dwilsonfl]

I do receive the Computrace screen when I press F1. This is an X60s I kind of like for travel or I'd trash it.

David

[dwilsonfl]

So I boot up my z61t and get the same message. Those laptops have nothing in common which is why I wondered about it spreading. The z61t's drivers are so different I can't swap a drive into it from the t6 or x6 laptops I have.

So is the consensus it's the Computrace lock at work, and the hard drives are fine? I'm afraid of a malware infection spreading.

TIA for your insight,

David

[ajkula66]

I do receive the Computrace screen when I press F1.

Even with the hard drive removed?

[RealBlackStuff]

If Computrace has been activated in your BIOS, you'll get that warning when you go into BIOS.
If not permanently activated, you can disable it in BIOS and the warning should go away.
If permanently activated, you can NOT disable it in BIOS and the warning will stay.
Either contact www.absolute.com to deactivate it or use other means to clean the EEPROM where this info is stored.

[dwilsonfl]

When you say "disable it in bios" do you mean turn the security chip setting to disable?

Thanks for your time,

David

[RealBlackStuff]

If your machine has activated Computrace (not Amerimed/Amerisys/whatever) it should have a Computrace setting in BIOS
and you should also get a warning when you go into BIOS.

PS: what about those Lenovo 3000 machines (without Computrace), still waiting for an answer.

[dwilsonfl]

There's no setting in the Bios that mentions Computrace. Just one screen at the beginning then the Amerisys screen blocks off everything else.

I put another HD in the X60s and installed Ubuntu and no screens and works fine. I think it must be a malware spoof.

Re: the 3000 machines, our school dropped another 4 Chromebooks on me so I'm fine. Thanks.

[cadillacmike68]

If your machine has activated Computrace (not Amerimed/Amerisys/whatever) it should have a Computrace setting in BIOS
and you should also get a warning when you go into BIOS.

PS: what about those Lenovo 3000 machines (without Computrace), still waiting for an answer.

My used T61 with Computrace activated arrived. I get the giant annoying red screen with the phone number. The only option is <Enter> for OK. I press Enter and get the regular T61 BIOS screen. It takes changes ok (have to remember to tab out of the time for it to take!)

However, there is no option anywhere that I can find for Computrace disabling, greayed out or not greyed out. It SHOULD be a BIOS setup option, but it is just not there...