a guy at work stole and changed my password and user name for my power book G4.
they also took the registration cards and start up disks.
apple won't help because i can't prove ownership (registration card) and i can't get into it to change my account back. is there a back door into it?
please help.
Daz >:(
someone changed my password and user name
November 22, 2004 - 12:41pm
#1
someone changed my password and user name
If it's work related, go to your manager.
If not, and you've had your disks and cards stolen, go to the police.
If you're running OS X, you need the install CD to reset the password.
If you are using X then you can boot up in single user mode and reset the password from the command line, try googling for it for full instructions. If you are using OS 9, then you will need an installer disk to boot up and trash the multiple users prefs.
TOM
Chris Breen explains (don't know why I hate that guy) how to force the initial Setup Assistant to run again, which isn't as good as resetting the p/w because I think you'll lose what's in your home folder, but its still a solution.
btw... here is how to reset the p/w, and figure out what the u/n is (hopefully, you're not lying and actually stole someone elses PowerBook and are simply trying to make it yours... your story sounds incredible, but I have to give fritterers the benefit of the doubt)
Hold down
S when booting
you will see a prompt
type
ls /Users
and it gives you a list of the directories of the users...
type (where USERNAME is one of the names of the directories in /Users)
passwd USERNAME
and you will be prompted to enter the new password in twice...
That resets that password, but not the username... Reboot the machine logging in normally with that username, whatever it was, and use the new password, and hopefully it is an adminsitrator account and you can add a NEW administrator account for yourself, then log in that new account and delete the old one.
Next, slash the tires of the employee who stole your stuff and be done with it...
I have done this with a couple of machines I owned...
I took my business card and wrote on the back of it "This machine was stolen and from the person named on the other side of this card!".
Then I went into the machine and found an obscure and hard to get to place and taped the card securely to the hard drive or back of the LCD or backplane of the keyboard. The card is taped hand-written side out.
At the minimum, this should support my claims to local authorities that the machine was intimately in my possession for some length of time. If this fact is concealed from the thief and the police question the thief as to whether I ever had the machine at any time, then they must explain why my fingerprints and business card (with such an incriminating message) are located inside said property. Their subsequent failure to produce a receipt for labor or bill of sale will bolster my claim. If you have ever been inside your case, bring this as proof to the authorities but conceal this fact from the theif - I always open that which I own to "touch" things. Fingerprints are easy to trace and hard to forge.
You may also be able to backtrace your ownership by obtaining a reprinted bill of sale from the original seller (like Circuit City or whomever). They should have listed the machine's serial number on the receipt with the method of payment (hopefully you used a credit card - makes tracing easier). Take the receipt to the police as well.
--DDTM
How or why did you end up with your registration cards and startup disks art work? :?
What is the full story, man? How is it you left your computer, logged in to your account, long enough for this to happen? Why did he take the start up disks and registration card... and not the PowerBook? And here is the big one... How in the heck did he change your password? He must have had your password... how did he get that? And even if he did change your username... your "Short Name" remains the same... I don't know if there is anyway to change that... ?
...cannot remember how, but you can change the short name with great effort. An alternative to that is to creat a new account and then log on as the root user and move all the userfiles to the new user, thus transporting everything over and replicating the user, but with a different short name - it is a PITA though.
Speculation: If I was going to steal something from somebody, I would try to first get the things that make it hard to fight against, like the registration card. That was a smooth move on the thief's part. Sending in the registration card would offer some recourse in my defense should I be caught, making it harder for the victim to counter my claims of ownership. Knowing some of the trick to boot into single usermode and some ins and outs of OpenFirmware helps make the actual theft easier.
Bottom line: the vitim should have sent in the registration card right away and never kept it with the machine. Keeping core software (i.e. install disks) with the machine should be the exception rather than the rule. Owners of protable devices should also own a locking cable for the obvious reason of locking things down weh unattended ('cuz you cannot take it with you all day long). Also, the machine's setting should be such that the screen saver kicks on after 3-5 minutes and requires a password for deactivation. (And I will apre you the lecture on choosing good a password.)
--DDTM
I beg to differ. My PowerBook, when I'm not in front of it, stays securely zipped inside its bag and at my side at all times. Maybe that's just because it belongs to my work, and if I lose it I won't get another one.
No to offend our original poster, and be assured I'm making no accusation, but posts like this with an interesting yet confounding backstory get my cynical SOB wheels a-movin in this post-Ravendarkness forum.
I know that if I were to five-finger a Powerbook only to find myself locked out, and went to a forum to look for a back door, the glaringly obvious thing to do would be to create a story such that the documented 'official' methods of using the install CD and going to Apple were removed as options for replies.
Again, not an accusation, just an amusing thought that probably says more about me than the original poster
...and it does not give confidence that this person has only ever posted this thread. My hope is that this is a lurker who has come in from the dark to seek help and I hope to hear from this person again to asuage my concerns.
We, as a community, are acting in good faith that the persons herein are of good intent and should not let the SLs of the worls deter us from taking care of each other.
But eeun is not alone in his 'cynicism'.
--DDTM
"in this post-Ravendarkness forum."
OK, I've been away awile... what happened to Ravendarkness?
Applefritter 2.0's first two-page thread happened, that's what
http://www.applefritter.com/node/view/4283
And an add-on / follow-up thread here:
http://www.applefritter.com/node/view/4452
Funny, I thought if Mr. Landon in yesterday's locked 'for sale' thread, back when Landon was using Dr. Zoidberg as his alias and threatening to sue everyone.
BTW, Michigan State has an updated picture of Steve:
http://www.state.mi.us/mdoc/asp/otis2profile.asp?mdocNumber=307030
Ah... a guest of the great state of Michigan... at the luxurios Cotton Hotel, no less. Well, is anyone going to follow through with the complaints, or is his incarceration enough karma to handle those too?