How’s this for an interesting use of technology.

The other day, I saw an AP article in The Boston Globe about a New York women who’d had her laptop (a Mac), and a bunch of other electronic goodies, stolen from her home.

The woman was able to track down the robbers when a friend alerted her to the fact that she appeared to be online when she wasn’t. The victim used a remote control Apple program, "Back to My Mac", to check that her Mac was, indeed, on the Web. And then used the stolen laptop’s camera to snap a photo of the perp, happily working away.

(Obviously, remote control isn’t a capability that’s exclusive to Mac’s, glorious and wonderful as Mac’s are - or so I hear.)

Anyway, armed with the photographic evidence provided by the canny Mac user, the police were able to make an arrest.

I think it’s terrific that this woman was able to thwart thieves and get back what’s rightfully hers. Serves them right, those tech-nabbers.

I also heard recently of another situation, this one corporate, in which an exec’s laptop had been ripped off on Day One, before IT had set it up with whatever the laptop equivalent of Lo-Jack is. Not to worry! Using remote technology, the IT shop was able to spot the errant laptop when the thief got on the Internet. Unbeknownst to the bad guy, the good guys in IT were able to download the Lo-Jack-ish software and the cops were able to find the laptop.

But am I the only one who finds some of this a little feature creepy?

Does this mean that someone I don’t know who figures out my IP address from some web site I brush past can activate the "Motion Eye" in the middle of my laptop and start watching me. OK, it’s not as if I sit around in the altogether hammering away at my work, but I don’t want someone out there watching me or taking pictures of me - even if they do get my good side.

All this new fangled stuff.

Most of it I like.

If someone steals my laptop, I absolutely want to get it back pronto.

But some of these creeping features are pretty darned creepy.

Should I call in the Geek Squad to make sure I’m secure? Or should I just put a piece of tape over the Motion Eye? (On second thought, that wouldn’t work, since I wouldn’t be able to catch the thief that way.

Ah, the perplexities of the tech-driven (tech-ridden?) life.

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