SoylentNews is people
SoylentNews
Earlier this year, a new type of mobile app blew the collective minds of many—including NBC News investigative reporter Jeff Rossen. Using the camera of a smartphone, these applications could scan a house key, allowing it to be duplicated remotely. Rossen warned America that it could allow someone to digitally steal your house keys if you left them unattended—by uploading photos and getting shipped a custom-cut copy. Of course, they could do the same thing with your house keys just by running with them to a nearby hardware store. But hackers !
One of the contenders in this market is called KeyMe ( https://key.me/ ). No one is going to shoulder surf your house key with KeyMe—it requires photos of a key placed on a white background, taken from 4 inches away. But KeyMe is doing something that will further boggle minds and will likely raise even more security concerns: using the app, you can store scanned copies of your keys on their server and download them at a kiosk. The company has been rolling out kiosks across the country and has just expanded its fleet after inking a deal to place them at the Lowe's home improvement chain. And you can also share your keys with others via e-mail, allowing them to make copies for themselves.
(Score: 4, Interesting) by VLM on Sunday March 22 2015, @11:47AM
Its easier to use a photocopier. You photocopy both sides of the key, then pick up a blank, then tape/glue/whatever a photocopy and start grinding on the dremel (keep it cool!) and eventually switch to file and finally using a photocopy and some calipers you get it exact-ish.
Non-security oriented locks (pretty much everything at a big box store, etc) are pretty weak by design to make it easy to "officially" copy keys so it turns out unofficial copies work pretty well too. You can buy high security locks for maybe $500 a piece and aside from being more secure, not being made in China to the lowest possible specs also means they'll work smooth as butter for 50 years at a time. I plan to upgrade my house locks in my infinite spare time, just to have quality locks.
You'd be surprised how few store clerks care about giving away blanks, IF you don't fit some stereotypical profiles.
I had to do this for a broken key where the clerks went all stupid mode "It don't fit in the machine cause its broke and it don't have the code stamped on it so we can cut to code so you'll have to cut off the lock and install a new one". Ah no thanks, I'll take care of it myself thanks.
Cut to code is another whole scam. (I look at my keychain) I have a bike rack on one of my cars hitches and a hitch lock with a stamped "027" so if you know its a double sided trailer hitch pin lock for whatever brand hitch lock then they can crack open a big book that says given a code 027 set the machine to whatever and it'll probably work. Lots of places won't give a guarantee on cut to code keys because the customers and employees are too dumb and the keyspace is really small (Imagine the duplication when everyone uses a couple alphanumeric chars for ALL codes). Also good luck figuring out if thats zero-27 or Oh-27.
The reason this doesn't matter for practical security, is its more effort to steal using a key than to buy a used '93 Giant crossover bicycle, and if I had a $15K bike a thief would simply cutting torch / angle grinder the hitch off the car. Or, frankly, steal the whole car and figure out how to remove the bike later and elsewhere.
A truly disruptive and interesting idea would be a QR code for keys with enough bits to uniquely ID all keys (like a MAC) AND some kind of ID of whoever purchased the key.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday March 22 2015, @02:00PM
Care to give some links to the security locks you are considering? I've seen many people make similar statements, but seldom if ever does anyone actually list the manufacturer or seller of suck locks. Thanks in advance for additional education/links!
(Score: 3, Informative) by darkfeline on Sunday March 22 2015, @02:58PM
Not him obviously, but here's an interesting lock design I've come across: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1ey2SFHbZV8 [youtube.com]
Join the SDF Public Access UNIX System today!
(Score: 1) by Jesus_666 on Sunday March 22 2015, @06:14PM
Extensive research (five minutes with Google) pointed me towards a certain "bosnianbill" who seems to know his locks. Oh look, there's even a buyer's guide [youtube.com]. That video should be a good place to start because it talks more about which features make certain locks hard to crack than about which specific locks to buy. Of course it's only a start. Going for a reputable brand is always a must, though.
Another source of information are independent testing outfits like the German Stiftung Warentest. Those guys regularly test samples of random product groups and are pretty thorough. You may need to pay for the precise test results but at least the rankings are often easily available.
Of course you have to match the lock with what you want to protect. Putting a 500 USD lock on a typical American front door won't do you much good if anyone can just jimmy the door open. Actually, it won't do you much good with a thick, heavy front door either because then they'll go for the windows. It's probably still a good idea to go for a reasonably decent lock, though; fewer people will want to physically break something open (which is noisy) than to just pick the lock. It's just that 100 bucks will probably buy you just as much actual security here as 500 bucks will.