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[Mark Rober] was fed up with packages going missing. He kept receiving notifications that his shipments had been delivered, but when checking his porch he found nothing there. Reviewing the CCTV footage revealed random passers-by sidling up to his porch and stealing his parcels. It was time to strike back. Over six months, [Mark] and his friends painstakingly designed, prototyped and iterated the perfect trap for package thieves, resulting in a small unit disguised as an Apple HomePod. The whole scheme is wonderfully over-engineered and we love it.
The main feature of the device is a spinning cup on the top which contains a large amount of glitter. When activated, it ejects glitter in every directions. You could say it's harmless, as it's just glitter. But then again, glitter has a way of staying with you for the rest of your life — turning up at the least expected times. It certainly leaves an emotional impression.
The trap uses an accelerometer to detect movement, geo-fencing to determine when the package has left the property, glitter and a fart spray to make the thief regret it, and smartphones to capture the thief's reaction for the enjoyment of the hacker.
Also at BBC.
See also: Jersey City PD, Amazon work together to catch package thieves
Jersey City PD nabs 12 this week in porch package sting
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday December 19 2018, @05:17AM (2 children)
Someone sends you a package bomb. You open it in your car and it kills you. The police will deem this your fault and if they find the person who sent the bomb to you, they'll shake their heads and say "whelp, the dead guy shoulda never opened the bomb, nothing we can do here, you're free to go."
LOL -- Ask Ted Kaczynski if he tried that defense.
No what will actually happen is that there may be some joint liability between you and the bomber if your car hits someone else, but to think the bomber gets off scott free? totally nuts.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday December 19 2018, @03:13PM
Your example if highly flawed. The package was not sent to the driver of the car. The package was *stolen* by the driver of the car. There is a huge difference there.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Immerman on Thursday December 20 2018, @03:33AM
Also, unlike an explosive, the glitter bomb is relatively harmless on its own. Which should be defense enough - otherwise nobody could afford to produce snakes-in-a-can and other novelty products that might startle you when driving, walking along the top of a cliff, etc.