[OLPC Security] Some anti-theft questions

[Alexander Todorov]

Chris Ball wrote:
> 
>    > e.g. A batch of 1000 laptops arrives at the school with the USB key
>    > containing 1000 activation codes. All machines are activated (as
>    > stated above) but only half of them go to children, the other half
>    > goes to a reseller. If the machines stay hidden for some time the
>    > cryptographic lease will expire and they will be disabled. But what
>    > happens if they are sold right away and used by customers? (in
>    > which case they will communicate to the servers and renew the
>    > lease)
> 
> I think the part you're missing is that the leases will only continue to
> be available from the school server that gave them out.  It's unlikely
> that the laptops would be sold to an outsider, but would then continue
> to remain within wireless range of the school server.
> 

Oh, did I? I didn't know that once activated the laptop will try to get 
the new lease from the school server. I was thinking that it will try to 
connect to a central government managed server.

"the country's OLPC oversight body may mail a USB drive to the school 
handler, which when connected to the school server, transparently 
extends the lease of each referenced laptop for some period of time."
from the P_THEFT section.

So the country oversight body will be able to generate valid leases for 
all the laptops in the country (all items in a school) and send them via 
USB key but that service may not be available on-line, right?

Thanks,
Alexander.