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from the security-of-everything-starts-in-the-firmware dept.
Home Depot Fights Shoplifting with Special Power Tools:
Home Depot has a clear message for professional shoplifters: Stay away.
The home-improvement chain is unveiling power tools that won't work unless they're properly scanned and activated at the register via Bluetooth technology. If a thief managed to smuggle a power drill out of the store without paying, the drill simply wouldn't turn on.
[....] "We certainly don't want to affect the 99.5% of our customers who are just there to pick up their hammers and nails," Glenn said. "We don't want to look like an armed encampment."
The new point-of-sale activation feature will allow the company to combat theft without significantly altering the shopping experience, Glenn said. After getting its suppliers, vendor partners, and internal IT team on board, Home Depot tested the feature at a handful of stores. It will now roll out to a broader assortment, with the goal of scaling to all of Home Depot's 1,988 US stores.
Glenn said he wasn't concerned about a potential rise in power-tool chop shops given that thieves are typically attracted by the prospect of an easy score and products with a high resale value.
"While these criminals are good at what they do, I think they're just going to go to the next easiest thing," Glenn said.
This tech could apply to to other items that must be activated in order to work: light bulbs, toys, breakfast cereal, etc.
(Score: 2, Interesting) by Ron on Wednesday August 04 2021, @02:12PM (2 children)
I have this exact same experience, but not just HD.
I've seen this at pretty much *all* of the big-box vendors.
It's the wal-mart way. They started it, now everyone else is trying to keep-up.
The only defense is like you said, inspect the packaging, buy from the back, look for signs of tampering.
When you find something tainted, add a little to the damage -- make it obvious for the next person who may not be as diligent as you and may be too busy in life to bother with returns.
It's an evil practice that works too well. We can make it harder for it to work. Destroy the packaging while it's still on the shelf. Don't put it back on the shelf, leave it on the floor. Etc.
(Score: 2) by Reziac on Wednesday August 04 2021, @02:52PM
Actually, Target started it, back in the late 1970s. For a while they had a policy that they would take returns without a receipt for =any= item that Target carries, whether the item came from Target or not. Naturally there was a rash of people trading in lightly-used merchandise of uncertain provenance for cash "refunds". It took 'em about a year to learn their lesson and go back to requiring receipts.
To my understanding, opened returns are not legal to be sold as new, hence "open box". But I'd guess corporate shaves that straight off the local store's profits, so they shave off the "opened and returned" as best they can, because margins are slim enough already.
My local Walmart has a discount rack that frequently sports stuff that's lost its packaging entirely, but I don't think I've ever seen an obviously returned item on the regular shelves. (Then again, it's a very nice smaller store, very well run. With a customer base that wouldn't put up with damaged but not suitably discounted.)
And there is no Alkibiades to come back and save us from ourselves.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 04 2021, @02:54PM
Years ago when my son was a couple of years old, I figured I'd be his barber. I went to Target and picked up a home barber kit (razor, comb, brush, and plastic smock). When I got home and opened it, all the pieces were there, but there was hair all over everything, like statically stuck to the plastic smock. I could have kept it (my barber uses the same razor and smock on me as his other customers), but it just made me mad. Mad at Target. I returned it and expressed my displeasure with the return desk (who, despite their "we're sorry" statement, I'm sure didn't care). I thought about going back there the next day just to see if they just turned around and put it back on the shelf, but I didn't want anything to do with them at that point. The whole thing turned me off from shopping there. I don't know if the stores think about things from that angle, or whether they care, but it had directly affected my opinion of the company and my desire to shop there.