(Exactly the same type of things that I write about. And, the kind of things
that I know that get people, all over the World, under more heavy
surveillance...) :)
I tried to make this stand out, a bit, but I guess I should take the
opportunity to make it clearer...
The computers that I mentioned, where I saw this happening, had both
*Microsoft Windows* installed in them.
(And, I can add that, they both seemed to have some sort of latent connection
to the Internet...)
I never saw this happening on computers running GNU/Linux.
Concerning the old Toshiba Celeron 433 MHz laptop,
It happened when the computer was completely shut down, and had the phone
line connected to its 56k internal modem. And, because I had heard, at the
time, from friends who know about this kind of issues, that it was possible
to turn on a computer, that had a phone line connected to it, through a
signal sent through the phone line (and, from what I understood, possibly get
inside a person's computer, when one thought it was safely turned off -
although, I have the impression that one would have to have a specific type
of phone modem and/or motherboard, for that to be possible) my immediate
reaction, was to unplug the phone line from the laptop. And, I subsequently
decided, at the time, to never let the phone line connected to the computer
again, when it was turned off. And, coincidence or not, the fact is that, I
never saw that happen again.
Concerning the other Toshiba laptop, which is, at most, a Intel Core 2 Duo,
Not only did I saw the computer repeatedly turn on, on its own, but I also
remember seeing it turn off, a few of those times. So, it was definitely
acting on its own. I have the impression that it was in some kind of
sleep/hibernate mode, when that happened. So, I don't know if the WiFi modem
was active enough to react to "outer stimulus". Or, whether this was a freak
type of behaviour, or not, for sleeping/hibernating laptops, which have
Windows installed in them. The fact is that, ever since the hard drive on
that same computer started malfunctioning, and that computer can now only
boot with a live GNU/Linux distro, running from the DVD drive, I never saw
that happen again.
I also never saw that happen with an old AMD64 laptop that, ever since I use
it, only runs GNU/Linux in it. And, I also never saw that happen with a
relatively recently bought Toshiba laptop, with a chip of the generation just
prior to this new "i3/i5/i7" ones, that, ever since it was bought, has only
run GNU/Linux.
So, this type of suspicious behaviour, was only observed, by me, in computers
with Microsoft Windows installed in them.
(And, as I implied... And, taking the opportunity to make things more
clear... And, unlike other things that happened to me... Concerning this type
of strange computer behaviour, I have *no idea* if this is an indication of
remote access, or not. The fact is that, nothing surprises me, any more, in
terms of surveillance. So, I wouldn't be surprised if I someday knew that it
was, indeed, an indication of remote access...)
But, of course, as you now know... Having GNU/Linux installed on your
computer is not protection enough for this new generation of Intel chips,
that can be remotely activated by a 3G radio signal...
But, as I said, I never observed any kind of suspicious behaviour on laptops
with chips of prior generations, running GNU/Linux.
So, I think it should be safe to use those.
(Although, one can never be 100% sure, about anything, relating to computer
security... And, I, nevertheless, usually cover the webcam of the recently
bought Toshiba laptop...) hehe :)
What a surreal world this is, that we live in...
