Police in Northern Ireland have announced an initiative whereby
students will have a
tracker device installed in their
laptops for free. The Holylands area of Belfast, which is densely populated by students, has experienced a spat of burglaries in which
notebook PCs have been stolen in recent weeks. Police officers are hoping that if a
computer is stolen, the tracker will enable them to track its movements remotely.
A spokeswoman for the Police Service of Northern Ireland said that the ‘greenlight to purchase the relevant
software had been given’. She added that the installation of devices would begin ‘sometime in the near future’, but a start date for the scheme is yet to be decided on. The spokeswoman added that it is unclear at present how much the initiative would cost, but that it should dramatically reduce the numbers of
notebooks being stolen.
Nora Duncan, Students' Union president at the University of Ulster, said: "We would welcome any effort being made to help students keep their property safe. We already work closely with the police on a number of issues and will inform our students about this particular scheme when more information becomes available.’