Twitter to Blame for Mac Pro Theft?

Nicole Martinelli ()

twitterburglary

An Arizona man with a video business wonders whether  indiscreet Tweets cost him a Mac Book Pro,  plus monitors and printer while on vacation.

“My wife thinks it could be a random thing, but I just have my suspicions,” Israel Hyman told the AP. “They didn’t take any of our normal consumer electronics.”

While he and his wife were on a trip to Kansas City, Hyman sent updates to around 2,000 followers on Twitter.

The timely thieves left behind an Xbox 360, a Wii and, fortunately, the Drobo where his Time Machine backup was housed. His later tweets note that they also left  a “too old” Macbook Pro behind — well, at least he has something to work on while police search for the criminals.

It’s hard to know police will be able to pin the crime to Twitter but keeping schtum about going on vacation — whether digitally or verbally — is kind of common sense.

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What’s your social media vacation policy?

9 comments »

About the author

nicole_martinelli

Nicole Martinelli is a San Francisco native who has lived in Milan and Florence, Italy. She's written for Wired.com, The New York Times and Newsweek. You can find her on Twitter , Facebook and Google+.

If you're doing something new/cool that's Apple related, email her about it.

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  • ItsGene

    How did the thieves know where this person lived?
    Did he post his home address in his Twitter feed?
    There’s something missing here…

  • LE Studios

    Yeah that’s why I closed my FaceBook and soon Twitter account. I don’t mind forums cause I post after I get back. These kind of sites its like tracking your every movements and yeah set you up to get robbed. cause usually we post our new purchase online. Just keep a MobileMe account and shut everything else down.

  • Luke

    Sometimes we lose our common sense. We get too comfortable. It would be like leaving the message “we are out of town, so we can’t come to the phone now. Please leave a message.”

  • http://www.zoomata.com Nicole Martinelli

    ItsGene — AP story didn’t spell it out but it look like his twitter account name is the same as his business name which is also the company URL. The whois for that looks like it lists the address of his home office…

  • ItsGene

    Nicole – yup, I was thinking it might be something convoluted like that. Which still makes me wonder about whether it was a random thief.
    I sure as heck wouldn’t have my actual home address on any of my domain registrations. Scary. I get enough spam from the email address in there, the last thing I want is scammers and thieves showing up at my home.

  • http://www.zoomata.com Nicole Martinelli

    ItsGene: dunno, I expected it to be a little *more* convoluted, it seems that he hasn’t changed any of the info, either.

    Guess that 2,000 followers — unless it’s someone following via RSS or something using keyword searches — really shouldn’t open you up to thieves, however.

    And you’re right, of course, who puts their home address on domain registration?

  • joebob

    My vacation rules are the same as my non-vacation rules: I don’t use them.

    These are children’s toys for narcissistic adults. It’s the double naught’s (00′s) equivalent of the Pet Rock, the Lacoste shirt, rainbow suspenders, Beanie Babies, and carrying a mobile phone the size of a lunch box.

    If I think I have something important to tell you, I’ll email, call, or speak with you in person.

  • Bob

    I just set up several booby traps around the house when I’m gone. I know that in some states this is illegal, but I live in Texas. We blow stuff up first and ask questions later.

    If the booby traps don’t work, the big angry dog might.

  • Michael

    I’m a teenager with my own domain, I can’t afford to hide the address and my home address is the only one I have. Any suggustions? Should I use a fake address or completely wipe it?