January 31, 2005

Easy Entry

Wired Magazine has a story on the Olympics of Lockpicking. Sounds like a fantastic party -- the personalities are great. Two sample paragraphs regarding the guy who broke the fact that Kryptonite Bicycle Locks can be picked with a BIC Pen: bq. Marc Weber Tobias is the author of Locks, Safes, and Security: An International Police Reference, a two-volume, 1,400-page compendium referred to here as De Bijbel. Last summer, Tobias' report on how to use a ballpoint pen to hack tubular locks - locks with circular key interfaces, like those made by Kryptonite - made headlines coast to coast. Much to the company's horror, Tobias publicly ridiculed their bike lock as an overpriced horseshoe. "Those people are unbelievably arrogant," he says with a smirk. "I can't wait to break their next design and destroy that company." bq. Tobias shrugs off the notion that by publicizing the vulnerability, he's creating a crime wave. "People are just mad because they wasted 50 bucks," he says. "People trust their lives and safety to these locks. But most locks are garbage. Look around, they're easy to open. Not knowing that doesn't make you safer." Tobias rolls his eyes and waggles his head incredulously. "I mean, what do people want - security through ignorance? Wake up." A good read! And of course, the book referenced: Locks, Safes, and Security is not available on Amazon so I am going to have to do some digging... Posted by DaveH at January 31, 2005 12:32 AM