Remind colleagues to lock their computer – or get pranked

The Coding Horror blog has written up the art of ‘goating’ – or pulling pranks on your co-workers when they forget to lock their computers. To hear him tell it, it’s a “for their own good” prank-cum-security-reminder. He lists a few of the more gentle “reminders” you can use such as installing the ‘bluescreen of death screensaver’, replacing the desktop with a screenshot of the desktop (and hiding all the visible items on it), switching the mouse from right to left handed, using the video driver settings to rotate the display left, right or upside down, or switching the keyboard layout from QWERTY to Dvorak.

I particularly liked the Clippy parody applet (see picture) and the embarrassing group emails sent out promising to buy the whole office doughnuts, or telling them “I like oranges!”

Some of the ”goating” pranks mentioned were downright nasty and unproductive. But I bet if the CEO of your company drops by your desk to ask you why you like oranges so much, you’ll remember to lock your computer next time.

So have you pranked in the name of security, or been pranked? Details in comments please. :)

Don’t forget to lock your computer [Coding Horror]