As others have noted, when these sorts of mechanisms are visible/known to the attacker it makes it very easy to circumvent the protection provided. The magnetic attachment is not "smart" in any way, so you could probably quickly "spoof" the connection with a strong magnet of your own. Better is using something wireless like Alan suggested, so it isn't quite so obvious that taking off with the laptop would cause problems. Don't most laptops come with accelerometers these days, too? I could swear I've read about drop sensors parking hard drives. Why not just use those same signals to fully "sleep" the laptop the same way closing the lid does, forcing re-authentication? 567c37f2776dc8b139645f40140e20fffe38d29d8015538fc8f1764f25d0bef1