Dumbass Xbox thief no match for smart Xbox owner

Davey Winder
Tuesday, 16 December 2008 16:03

Your IT - Entertainment

What would you do if your Xbox 360 was stolen? Giving up on ever seeing his games console again was not an option for one student who suffered such a fate.

The only people to steal away my Xbox 360 have been the Microsoft Gremlins with their evil curse of the red rings.

However, I can sympathise with Missouri State student Ryan Ketsenburg over the feelings of loss he experienced when his console was nicked. When my Xbox 360 Elite died last week I waited all of 2 hours before buying a new one.

Sadly there were none of the brand spanking new low-power Jasper powered consoles to be found here in the UK, but Amazon was good enough to fill the gap with a Falcon model within 24 hours.

Ketsenburg didn't even have to wait that long to find his Xbox though. After it was nicked from his halls of residence, he filed a report with the Springfield Police Department (no, seriously.)

However, applying a little logic, Ketsenburg guessed that if the thief was another student then he just might be able to track him down. Using his wireless network controller, which the thief had left behind, he set about searching for the Xbox to which it was still registered.

The hunch proved to be a good one, the Xbox controller was connecting to the missing Xbox. The stolen goods were obviously still nearby, on the fifth floor it turned out.

He got his Xbox back, although the thief had already formatted the hard drive so all his game save data was lost.

Apparently the suspect has not yet returned to his room, and so does not realise the property has been recovered. If they had taken the Xbox with them, nobody would be any the wiser.

Dumbass!