why i love ebay or dumpster diving w/o getting your hands dirty

[mouseling]

My advisor buys a lot of stuff from ebay - all of it is geek/security/spy related - one of his long time obsessions centers around nagra reel-to-reel recorders (movie references: Diva, or The Conversation)

Anyway, at HOPE he took delivery of an old spy nagra - and it turns out the tape it came with wasn't empty. It had a surveillance tape from an informant going to a drug buy on it.

the same thing happened when we got the wiretap equipment a few years ago. It came complete with people's private info on it.

Here, listen for yourself (names have been bleeped to protect the informants - but, I do have an original copy...)

http://www.crypto.com/blog

-mouse

[lil_freak]

Re: why i love ebay or dumpster diving w/o getting your hands dirty

Garage Sales and Flea Markets are also a great way to pick up cheap stuff with "interesting information" still on it.

Old cell phones are my favorite to pick up

[theprez98]

Re: why i love ebay or dumpster diving w/o getting your hands dirty

Garage Sales and Flea Markets are also a great way to pick up cheap stuff with "interesting information" still on it.

Old cell phones are my favorite to pick up

Same for hamventions and computer fests...

[xor]

Re: why i love ebay or dumpster diving w/o getting your hands dirty

Heck, you guys should be around for my yearly "purge" of old gear.

xor

You know it's bad when you have one of those uber xxx-large trash can size zip lock bags filled with patch cables of every sort and type.

[streaker69]

Re: why i love ebay or dumpster diving w/o getting your hands dirty

Heck, you guys should be around for my yearly "purge" of old gear.

xor

You know it's bad when you have one of those uber xxx-large trash can size zip lock bags filled with patch cables of every sort and type.

I've been purging gear taken out of service from our plant. So far, I haven't found anyone interested in taking the stuff off my hands.

[barry99705]

Re: why i love ebay or dumpster diving w/o getting your hands dirty

I've been purging gear taken out of service from our plant. So far, I haven't found anyone interested in taking the stuff off my hands.

Probably because it's like that government auctioned vett. You just can't get the stink out of it.

[0x58]

Re: why i love ebay or dumpster diving w/o getting your hands dirty

What kind of gear is it?

[valanx]

Re: why i love ebay or dumpster diving w/o getting your hands dirty

living in a college town, dumpster diving at the end of semesters is especially beneficial. While I like ebay, I really like foreign grad students who dont want to ship anything back home so they just toss it all.

Or they get rid of it for essentially the money to buy liquor for one last party.

[Greyhatter]

Re: why i love ebay or dumpster diving w/o getting your hands dirty

living in a college town, dumpster diving at the end of semesters is especially beneficial.
Or they get rid of it for essentially the money to buy liquor for one last party.

Hehe.. Our college dumpster always contained large amounts of empties and the smell of ralph at the end of semester... not where I would dive.

[xor]

Re: why i love ebay or dumpster diving w/o getting your hands dirty

I've been purging gear taken out of service from our plant. So far, I haven't found anyone interested in taking the stuff off my hands.

I wouldn't touch it with a ten foot roll of toilet paper .

xor

[valanx]

Re: why i love ebay or dumpster diving w/o getting your hands dirty

Hehe.. Our college dumpster always contained large amounts of empties and the smell of ralph at the end of semester... not where I would dive.

Grad students, particularly foreign ones, are not really a mad bunch of party animals.

Now the frat houses, well you can smell them quite a way away. Smells like date rape and daddy got me a job happy sweats.

[barry99705]

Re: why i love ebay or dumpster diving w/o getting your hands dirty

Grad students, particularly foreign ones, are not really a mad bunch of party animals.

Now the frat houses, well you can smell them quite a way away. Smells like date rape and daddy got me a job happy sweats.

So what does.... Aww, never mind. I don't want to know.....

[HawaiinDarkStar]

Re: why i love ebay or dumpster diving w/o getting your hands dirty

My dad, recently retired, has been collecting old lap tops for years to play with and fix up. He got one such lap top last year that we figured all the person did was turn it off and ship it... had EVERY thing of the theirs on it, and guess what the log on password was... PASSWORD... -_- the hd was wiped in the end though, by us.

[Greyhatter]

Re: why i love ebay or dumpster diving w/o getting your hands dirty

He got one such lap top last year that we figured all the person did was turn it off and ship it... had EVERY thing of the theirs on it, and guess what the log on password was... PASSWORD... -_- the hd was wiped in the end though, by us.

You were probably subjected to the "it's hot" or "it's invisible" phenomenon. Most who rip off and resell laptops really don't care what's on them unless there's private data to be turned into cash. Sadly, there are also those who believe they're selling their computer "as is" and do not care, know how, or have time to wipe the drive, thus once they sell it it's gone and for all intent purposes invisible now that it's out of their life.

[shadow.phisher]

Re: why i love ebay or dumpster diving w/o getting your hands dirty

Where would we be if people bothered to check to make sure that their personal info was removed.

Garage sales and flea markets are the best for this type of purchase imho