Can Administrators See Deleted History?

[Beau Bridges]

Okay, so where I live we are handed MacBooks in our high school for education purposes. In the form we have to sign, it says that they will be used strictly for educational purposes. We are allowed to bring them home, I have gone on FaceBook and MySpace on Firefox time and time again. I delete the history everytime, I was wondering if when I delete the histhory will the administrator account will be notified?

Also, what can the administrator find out about what I do on my user account?

[Sam Symons Veteran]

Not too sure about that, but Private Browsing it totally the way to go (Y)

[APH-Alex]

Incognito!!!!!

[Subject Delta]

Nope, they can't see deleted history though I suppose if they really wanted to nail you that badly they could use forensic data recovery tools :laugh:

[drshdw]

I doubt they care. But I'm sure it's logged somewhere, even in Private Browsing mode.

[Elliott]

They really don't care (I went to the school system that practically started the whole iBook/MacBook program), but they did load software that, despite whatever you did to your browser's history (even Private Browsing), logged the activity.

[yeoo_andy_ni]

I work in education, and having just been in the library, there was a student sitting playing flash games. Even though he signed the agreement saying that he would use the College's ICT services and systems for educational use.

Unless you are using Facebook and MySpace on they schools corporate network, I wouldn't worry one bit. If you continue to use it at home and on your own wireless LAN, I don't see you having any issues. Just don't start looking at porn, warez or terrorist activities even at home on it, as the filter will report it back to the Admins and then you will be questioned (if the filter is installed or exists). Facebook and MySpace are innocent. Building a bomb or watching a "teenie" get "nailed" is not.

[Subject Delta]

I doubt they care. But I'm sure it's logged somewhere, even in Private Browsing mode.

Nope, nothing is saved in that mode, not in IE anyway

I work in education, and having just been in the library, there was a student sitting playing flash games. Even though he signed the agreement saying that he would use the College's ICT services and systems for educational use.

Unless you are using Facebook and MySpace on they schools corporate network, I wouldn't worry one bit. If you continue to use it at home and on your own wireless LAN, I don't see you having any issues. Just don't start looking at porn, warez or terrorist activities even at home on it, as the filter will report it back to the Admins and then you will be questioned (if the filter is installed or exists). Facebook and MySpace are innocent. Building a bomb or watching a "teenie" get "nailed" is not.

What if you use Facebook and Myspace to chat up teenie girls? :laugh:

[Rudy]

What if you use Facebook and Myspace to chat up teenie girls? :laugh:

he's in high school.....that's probably what he's doing (and it's legal for him)

[aussiefloyd_fan]

i think safari4 has some off the record mode you could go into.... not sure i think its in the settings tab

[dead.cell]

Use InPrivate mode on Firefox. Ctrl+Shift+P is your friend.

As for "if they can find out", sure they could, but it'd be a complete waste of time to run all sorts of tools in an attempt to bust you for checking Facebook or Myspace, especially since doing so is not a crime.

Now, if you're on the school network, I'm pretty sure they can trace what IPs were hit on their network.

[acnpt]

I work in education, and having just been in the library, there was a student sitting playing flash games. Even though he signed the agreement saying that he would use the College's ICT services and systems for educational use.

Chill, back in college we used to play games during the lessons :laugh: .

You will be fine, its just a wide reason for them take the laptop back from you if you watch alot of porn, use P2P whilst on their network(including VPN).

Edit: Oh your in school, they might be a little bit more anal about it.

[the evn show]

Okay, so where I live we are handed MacBooks in our high school for education purposes. In the form we have to sign, it says that they will be used strictly for educational purposes. We are allowed to bring them home, I have gone on FaceBook and MySpace on Firefox time and time again. I delete the history everytime, I was wondering if when I delete the histhory will the administrator account will be notified?

Also, what can the administrator find out about what I do on my user account?

Depending on how the macbooks are configured they may not need to have access to the computer to see what you're up to.

Private browsing is intended to keep casual users from snooping on you (ie: your parents won't be able to see where you browse porn), it's completely inadequate for preventing an attacker from checking up on you when they have physical access to the computer (like the administrator who gave it to you).

If you're paranoid: install Mac OS X on an external drive and boot from that whenever you want to do things you're not supposed to be doing. An 80gb drive is more than enough and you can find them online for about $35. This approach leaves you immune to all but the most dedicated attackers

[offroadaaron]

Nope, nothing is saved in that mode, not in IE anyway

They'd have some kind of proxy or something logging it all, I'm sure.

[MikeChipshop Member]

I'd say it depends on who's network your using, if your connect through your schools pipe then if they're that bothered they'll be logging where your going anyway. They may have installed snooping software through the Admin account (at my work place, a London district council, they have done this on some machines).

That is quite expensive and they are probably just bluffing to be on the safe side.

[Subject Delta]

They'd have some kind of proxy or something logging it all, I'm sure.

They can't proxy your home connections though, only connections made through their network

[sn00pie]

If your using it at school then I'm sure they can log everything you view on there network. If you take it home then I don't think there's much they can do...unless they have software that monitors you installed on the laptop. Then no matter what you do is logged, if not, private browsing is the way to go.

[Geranium_Z__NL]

hmmz at my school everything gets logged.. theres a simple "agree" "do not agree" button @ windows start.. and if u agree.. you allow ur passwords etc etc to be saved and stored for at least 6 years.

is against crime or something... i dont mind tho lol

[Elliott]

They can't proxy your home connections though, only connections made through their network

Unless it's a client-side proxy (one that goes through localhost:whateverport) that tracks all traffic and logs it until it can upload to the main server (which is what my school system had).