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Off topic, bump keys
I remember one time going to visit friends who lived in a secure highrise
that had a guard at the front desk and a door that required a key at the back. We had never been there before, and so by mistake found ourselves at the back door which was locked and noone there to open it. We thought we would need to go around to the front, and it was a really large building complex, so it would have taken us a while and we were reluctant to do so, when we saw a teenager coming by. To this day, I do not know whether he actually lived there and had a key and just wanted to show off, or whatnot. He asked us whether we had a credit card or something like it, and when we handed it to him, he opened the door to this "secure" highrise as quickly and efficiently as if he had had a key (and he gave us back our card, so no, this was not an ingenious scheme of steeling a credit card :-) Joanna "Aaron Hicks" wrote in message ... Hey, Mark. Glad to see there's another locksmith in the group. I worked my way through college as a locksmith; I don't do it every day, but I do keep on top of it. Anyway- what Mark said. Most theft and break-ins are functions of opportunity. It's easier to break a window next to a door and open it on up- good reason to use double-cylinder deadbolts, although there are safety risks if you do so. Tip: Keep a key on a hook at floor level near the door, or at least keep a key in the lock in the event of fire. Theft involving direct manipulation of a lock- picking or bumping- is very rare indeed. Some locks- like Kwiksets- are easy enough to bypass without bump keys. Have a Kwikset key-in-knob lock? A pair of vice grips and a machine screw will do it- pop the cup and directly manipulate the mechanism with a screwdriver. Cinch. People want a cheap lock on the door, and they get what they pay for. The $18 piece of pot metal won't do the same job as a $160 Medeco. Even then, unless the strike is done correctly- anchored into a wall stud with the 3" screws each lock comes with- it's still easy enough to kick it in. Lots of houses just have the strike put in place without the anchor screws thanks to lazy or cheap builders. It all looks the same once it's finished. Bump keys are just an extension of a long history of bypassing locks the easy way. Maybe Mark'll remember the "ice pick" attacks from the early 1990's when some genius figured out you could directly manipulate the latch after piercing the door- bypassing $300 locksets almost as fast as you could with the key. That's why all modern latches (the good ones, anyway) come with integral shrouds. The address in the header doesn't work. Send no email there. -AJHicks Chandler, AZ |
#2
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Off topic, bump keys
On Sat, 02 Dec 2006 14:53:31 GMT in Lrgch.1771$QC.1691@trnddc02 J Fortuna wrote:
I remember one time going to visit friends who lived in a secure highrise that had a guard at the front desk and a door that required a key at the back. We had never been there before, and so by mistake found ourselves at the back door which was locked and noone there to open it. We thought we would need to go around to the front, and it was a really large building complex, so it would have taken us a while and we were reluctant to do so, when we saw a teenager coming by. To this day, I do not know whether he actually lived there and had a key and just wanted to show off, or whatnot. He asked us whether we had a credit card or something like it, and when we handed it to him, he opened the door to this "secure" highrise as quickly and efficiently as if he had had a key (and he gave us back our card, so no, this was not an ingenious scheme of steeling a credit card :-) Yeah, had the same sort of thing at one employer. The manager responsible for badge access to the datacenter was moved to someone that wasn't a very responsive individual. We discovered that our ID badges worked just fine to jimmy the lock to the datacenter. The toughest lock I ever encountered was to the bathroom off of the cubicle area of a largely vacant building. The previous folks there were polite enough to lock the doors before they left and before the summer was out the water had evaporated out of the traps. We finally popped two ceiling tiles and dropped in to unlock it :-). -- Chris Dukes elfick willg: you can't use dell to beat people, it wouldn't stand up to the strain... much like attacking a tank with a wiffle bat |
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