Uninstall Prey from Mac

May 21, 2016 5:36 AM

I have Prey installed on my Mac and need to uninstall it to troubleshoot an Internet connectivity issue. They provide no uninstaller—their site only instructs to type in a command line in Terminal, but when I do so I get "Command not found." I have written Prey three times and they do not respond. Anyone have suggests? Thanks very much...
posted by Mitchla to Computers & Internet (9 answers total)

Are you logged in as an admin user? You tried the alternate command on the uninstaller page? And you're copying-and-pasting instead of typing?

If all the above is true, try re-installing Prey and then run the uninstall command again.
posted by Johnny Wallflower at 5:44 AM on May 21, 2016 [1 favorite]

Can you post the command you're trying to run, and copy/paste the exact output from Terminal?
posted by Venadium at 6:38 AM on May 21, 2016 [2 favorites]

Have you upgraded OS X since the install, it is possible/likely that some key deeply buried parts will get overwritten by a major OS update. If you login to the PreyProject website, is it still gettng updates from the device?
posted by Lanark at 8:29 AM on May 21, 2016

Response by poster: Hi all. Here is what I copied/pasted from their Uninstall page and what Teminal responded with. (Terminal asked for my password, so I entered it and pasted in the command again.)

___________________________________

[Restored May 21, 2016, 11:51:05 AM]
Last login: Sat May 21 08:48:41 on console
Restored session: Sat May 21 08:27:32 EDT 2016
Mitchs-MacBook-Pro:~ MitchRose$ sudo /usr/local/lib/prey/current/bin/prey config hooks pre_uninstall && sudo rm -rf /usr/local/lib/prey /var/log/prey.log /etc/prey
Password:
sudo: /usr/local/lib/prey/current/bin/prey: command not found
Mitchs-MacBook-Pro:~ MitchRose$ sudo /usr/local/lib/prey/current/bin/prey config hooks pre_uninstall && sudo rm -rf /usr/local/lib/prey /var/log/prey.log /etc/prey
sudo: /usr/local/lib/prey/current/bin/prey: command not found
Mitchs-MacBook-Pro:~ MitchRose$

_____________________________________________

Yes, I have reinstalled the current version of Prey and then tried to Uninstall.

I have upgraded the OS since originally installing Prey some years ago, but the Control Panel page does show that it's still getting the Mac location.

Thanks very much...
posted by Mitchla at 8:56 AM on May 21, 2016

Try the other command, the one they tell you to use if you get the "command not found" error:

sudo /usr/lib/prey/current/bin/prey config hooks pre_uninstall && sudo rm -rf /usr/lib/prey /var/log/prey.log /etc/prey

It looks for the files in a different directory.
posted by Johnny Wallflower at 9:45 AM on May 21, 2016 [1 favorite]

Looks like the path to your prey install is wrong - it's not "/usr/local/lib/prey/current/bin/prey".

You can maybe find the right path by running

which prey

or if that doesn't give you anything, try

sudo find / -name prey

and see if that gives you something ending in bin/prey. Then replace "/usr/local/lib/prey/current/bin/prey" in your pasted command with the path you find.
posted by corvine at 9:45 AM on May 21, 2016

Response by poster: Johnny, I have tried both of those.

Corvine,
which prey
gives me:
mitchellrose% which prey
prey: Command not found.

sudo find / -name prey
gives me:
mitchellrose% sudo find / -name prey

WARNING: Improper use of the sudo command could lead to data loss
or the deletion of important system files. Please double-check your
typing when using sudo. Type "man sudo" for more information.

To proceed, enter your password, or type Ctrl-C to abort.
posted by Mitchla at 10:13 AM on May 21, 2016

Go ahead and enter your password to execute the find, then follow corvine's directions and replace the path (in two spots in the command).

BTW, if you don't have Find Any File then you should get it. It finds things that Spotlight ignores (like the "prey" file you're hunting).
posted by Johnny Wallflower at 11:20 AM on May 21, 2016

Response by poster: With FIND ANY FILE the only thing I could find was:
com.prey.agent.bom Document
com.prey.agent.plist Proxy Plist   

And now when I go to the Prey CP, is shows the Mac as Unavailable. I have the feeling the uninstall command worked one of these recent times.

Thanks so much for your help, everyone. Very grateful for your time. AskMeFi rocks.
posted by Mitchla at 11:43 AM on May 21, 2016