$500 for the hassle is hardly compensation. It takes days just to get old software installed and a laptop configured, let alone trying to restore backups.

BestBuy should be on the hook for damages and penalties related to identity theft linked to the lost laptop. Hard to add that up to $54M, though.

Raelyn Campbell seems to be VERY highly connected and if her contacts — maybe many with unlisted phone numbers — have been compromised, there is more to this story than is covered in the article.

Lost laptop? Sue for millions!

Is your laptop worth $54 million? Raelyn Campbell of Washington, D.C., is suing Richfield-based Best Buy for that amount after it lost her laptop computer while it was in for repairs.

Campbell, who could not be reached Tuesday, filed a negligence lawsuit suit against the company in Washington Superior Court on Nov. 16, seeking fair compensation for replacement of the $1,100 computer and extended warranty, plus expenses related to identity theft protection.

Best Buy spokeswoman Nissa French said in an e-mail that Campbell “was offered and collected $1,110.35″ as well as “a $500 gift card for her inconvenience.”

According to Campbell’s blog at bestbuybadbuyboycott.blogspot.com, Geek Squad employees spent three months telling her different stories about where her laptop might be before finally acknowledging that it had been lost.

Students Must Carry And Pay For GPS-Based Cell Device reports this headline from Montclair State.

Here’s the money quote from the article:

“What it does is allow students to have an extra pair or group of people watching over them when they’re going from one location to another,” Montclair Police Department Chief Paul Cell said.

Going back as far as 2004, when PC World noted Privacy Watch: Soon, Your Cell Phone May Be Tracking You: GPS chips in handsets make cell phone tracking services a reality, you were warned that the chips in your phones may also be used to spy on you. More recently, this year, the more left-leaning PBS had a special entitled GPS Technology Helps Parents Track Teens.

I don’t know about you, but I am a big bearded guy between the ages of 20 and 50 who doesn’t mind being wanded at the airport. I’m more concerned about leaving my cell phone powered on and who might be tracking where I am when I am not aware of it.

What do you think? Comment.