Policies

The Policies feature is only available if at least one of your devices is assigned a Find & Protect my Dell by Absolute license.

The Policies area includes the Offline Policy, which automatically locks a device if it goes offline and don't contact the Absolute Monitoring Center for a defined number of days. If you want to ensure that your devices are protected, even when they are powered off or a network connection is unavailable, configure an Offline Policy.

Note that only one Offline Policy can be enabled at a time, and the policy applies to all devices assigned a Find and Protect my Dell by Absolute license.

After the Offline Policy is enabled, a timer—set to the number of days specified in the policy—starts to count down on each device. Each successful agent check-in to the Absolute Monitoring Center resets the timer.

If a device fails to check in before the timer expires, it locks automatically and an email notification is sent to the addresses specified in the policy configuration. On the device's Details page, it's Lock status is updated to one of the following:

  • Locked by Offline Policy: the timer has expired and the device has checked in to confirm its status
  • The device was presumed locked on <date and time> due to the Offline Policy: the timer has expired, but the device has not yet checked in to confirm its status

The device remains locked until you unlock it.

To configure the Offline Policy:

  1. Tap and tap Enable. Click and click Enable.
  2. In field near the top of the page, enter the number of days a device must be offline before it is automatically locked. The default value is 30 days, but any value from 4 to 2000 days is supported.
  3. The Send email field is prepopulated with your email address, but you can change it, or add additional email addresses.
  4. In the Lock device field, enter the message you want to display on the device when it's locked. You can enter up to 500 characters.

    In the current release, you can't add images or format the text.

  5. [Optional] To activate the policy later, click the blue activation slider to set it to Off (gray).To activate the policy later, tap the blue activation slider to set it to Off (gray).
  6. Click Save. Tap Save. The configured policy shows on the Policies page.
  7. To see which devices received the policy, go to each device's Details page and view the status in the Offline Policy field.

To activate the Offline Policy if it's deactivated:

  1. Tap . Click .

  2. Click the gray activation slider. Tap the gray activation slider.

    The activation slider is set to On (blue).

The policy will not be activated on each device until they check in to receive the update.

Deactivating the Offline Policy in the portal deactivates the policy on each device and stops the timer from counting down. If a device was locked by the policy, it remains locked, but you can unlock it.

To deactivate the Offline Policy:

  1. Tap . Click .

  2. Click the blue activation slider and click Disable. Tap the blue activation slider and tap Disable.

    The activation slider is set to Off (gray).

The policy will not be deactivated on each device until they check in to receive the update.

Deleting the Offline Policy in the portal deletes the policy and its timer on each device. If a device was locked by the policy, it remains locked, but you can unlock it.

To edit or delete the policy:

  1. Tap . Click .
  2. Click Edit. Tap Edit.
  3. Do one of the following:
  • To update the policy configuration, edit the fields and click Save. To update the policy configuration, edit the fields and tap Save.
  • To delete the policy, click Delete Policy and click Delete. To delete the policy, tap Delete Policy and click Delete.

Your changes will not be applied to each device until they check in to receive the update.