Duplicating Your Housekeys, From a Distance 287
Roland Piquepaille writes "Some clever computer scientists at UC San Diego (UCSD) have developed a software that can perform key duplication with just a picture of the key — taken from up to 200 feet. One of the researchers said 'we built our key duplication software system to show people that their keys are not inherently secret.' He added that on sites like Flickr, you can find many photos of people's keys that can be used to easily make duplicates. Apparently, some people are blurring 'numbers on their credit cards and driver's licenses before putting those photos on-line,' but not their keys. This software project is quite interesting, but don't be too afraid. I don't think that many of you put a photo of their keys online — with their addresses." I wonder when I'll be able to order more ordinary duplicate keys by emailing in a couple of photos.
Eyeballing my Cadillac (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:People put photos of their keys online? (Score:5, Interesting)
Duplicating keys from an X-Ray (Score:4, Interesting)
That's nothing! On the Discovery Health channel there was a story about a man that swallowed his friend's car key. They were too drunk to drive home and he wanted to prevent his friend from driving while drunk. To make a long story short, the spare key was lost and they they were able to make duplicate keys from an X-Ray that clearly showed the key.
Re:Interesting but pointless (Score:5, Interesting)
http://www.boingboing.net/2005/06/25/locksmith-makes-key-.html
Re:Interesting but pointless (Score:5, Interesting)
Not quite. Depending on the key, of course, all you need to do is get the code and figure out the style. Then you could get replacements sent to you from the manufacturer.
In fact, some keys (I'm talking to you, cheap schlage locks) print the key code ON THE KEY, so you wouldn't even need to do any kind of fitting if the photo happened to be of the right side.
But, of course, why bother having a particularly secure lock, when your all-metal steel-bolted door is right next to a 6 foot plate-glass bay window?
Re:interesting.... (Score:4, Interesting)
I think that a more valuable use of resources would be to recyle the tinfoil sitting on your head.
Re:People put photos of their keys online? (Score:1, Interesting)
Doesn't anyone remember this one?:
Diebold key reproduced from key:
http://it.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=08/02/06/1627220
Re:As the saying goes... (Score:3, Interesting)
Indeed; I'd rather they took a picture of my key with a telephoto lens and got in that way than to have them break a window. Unfortunately, thieves are lazy or they'd get a job and it's a hell of a lot asier to break a window or use a crowbar on the door than to go to the trouble of photographing your key.
That's one thing I hate about my car - the goddamn "open trunk" button. Previous cars I'd leave the doors unlocked and nothing of value inside, and windows down if the weather permitted (because thieves are stupid and don't care about your property, they'll break the window just assuming it's locked).
With that damned button all they have to do to break into my trunk is break the driver window and push the button. I'm wondering what lazy idiot designed that "feature"? Especially since there's another button to open the trunk on my keychain? Duh!!!!
Re:Eyeballing my Cadillac (Score:3, Interesting)
A friend of mine during college used the same technique to duplicate a master key that fit most of the doors in our (somewhat small) school. He's always been an interesting character, though. That was several years ago and today he's a sysadmin but on the weekends he practices blacksmithing.
Re:Interesting but pointless (Score:5, Interesting)
Variations on that method would work on most frame houses built during the last fifty years but burglars still attack doors and windows. This, of course, is because most are remarkably stupid (intelligent criminals go into politics).
Re:Bump keys more practical (Score:5, Interesting)
Chubb (the venerable English lock maker) actually has a prison lock where part of its construction is to make it resistant to eyeballing by inmates, so they can't memorize the cuts on it and create a copy with sheet metal or another source.
Other than that, a few keys that are eyeball resistant that come to mind are the Shlage Primus, and the Medeco3 key, because someone would have to eyeball the slider, the pin depth cuts, and the angles of the cuts for the pins to rotate.
Re:Eyeballing my Cadillac (Score:2, Interesting)
Do it the easy way.
Go to Home Depot and buy a long, skinny steel tape (it's a flat piece of metal).
Bring the tape and pliers to a car. Look through the window, see where the big lock button is. Usually next to the handle.
Shape the tape with the pliers, slide the tape in through the back of the window, grab the lock button with the bent end of the tape, and pull.
Bingo.
I did that once, in snow, with an old T-square and a leatherman tool, and got into my pickup truck to get my keys back. It only took about ten minutes.
I wrecked the T-square though.
Re:As the saying goes... (Score:2, Interesting)
My car ('03 Sentra) has a lever inside the trunk by the lock. When flipped down, the electronic trunk release no longer functions, and you must use the key lock to open the trunk. Maybe yours does, too; have you looked?
Re:Interesting but pointless (Score:1, Interesting)
Quite a few houses lack that, especially low end ones, like those that H4H puts up. There is a bit of plywood near the corners, but most of the house is vinyl, house wrap, insulation, then dry-wall. If
Re:Interesting but pointless (Score:4, Interesting)
It's a lot easier to steal shit if no one has any idea you were there in the first place.
Neighbor: "db32's on vacation... what are you doing here?"
Thief: "Oh, he gave me a key to watch the house, see?"
Neighbor: "Oh, alright then."
Thief proceeds to park in the garage, load up car with everything, and leave, with days (or weeks) of lead time to unload stolen goods.
It's not a bad idea to keep your keys from being photographed. People will use a much more difficult way of breaking in if it gives them a better chance of not getting caught.
Broad daylight crimes (Score:4, Interesting)
I've seen it done. Thieves backed a truck up to one of the homes in my neighborhood, opened the garage door, wheeled out the appliances and left.
I saw it happen as did several other neighbors, but it was one of the showhomes the builder was trying to sell and we figured that they buyer probably wanted a different appliance option and they were just going to switch them out. In retrospect they probably went into the home when it was showing on the weekend and left a window unlatched.
They did it on a weekday afternoon, broad daylight and wearing somewhat matching uniforms and they just blended in.
Re:Eyeballing my Cadillac (Score:1, Interesting)
My dad cut a key from memory once when he lost the key to his Ford van. This post caught my eye because I am also a system administrator/blacksmith.
Re:Bump keys more practical (Score:2, Interesting)
Disklock Pros are rather hard to copy.
Taking eyeballing out of the picture - even if you have the code for the key on hand, your first problem is getting a blank.
Blanks are restricted, but even if you manage to get your hands on them, they're pre-cut at the abloy factory [usually 2 pins] depending on your account with them - to prevent locksmiths with less scruples than others cutting abloys.
Nonsense! The laundry machines at my old apartment used an Abloy DiscLock. I made a compatible blank out of a mid-90's Saab key filed down to the shape of the keyway. It's pretty easy. Nothing like trying to duplicate the side milling of a restricted Medeco Biaxial key (though there's a Rolls Royce ignition key that'll pass the common Medeco G3 Biaxial with only minor adjustment). Restricted blanks only stop amateurs, and the Abloy DiscLock is hardly even sophisticated enough to be called "restricted". It's a half moon shape, sometimes with a half moon groove in the flat side.
Then of course, there's the machine to cut them.
The laundry key I made I filed by hand. A machine makes it downright simple, a complete no-brainer. Filing by hand if you know the specs is harder, but not prohibitively so. Trying to file a key when you DON'T know the specs will be nigh impossible, but if you don't know the specs, you're an amateur.
Even if you're filing by hand, the tolerances are fine, and the key configuration doesn't really take to soldering as regular keys do...
The tolerances aren't THAT fine. It's basically a wafer-class lock with stamped parts. It can't have fine tolerances. Granted, it's tougher if you don't have a sample lock to fit the key to, but it's not rocket science.
Re:People put photos of their keys online? (Score:3, Interesting)
Doesn't anyone remember this one?:
Diebold key reproduced from key: http://it.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=08/02/06/1627220 [slashdot.org]
The real astounding thing about the Diebold key that he probably didn't realize was that he likely didn't need to duplicate the key, but rather need only look through his junk drawer. I'm a locksmith, and I can tell just from looking at the picture of the key that it's a National C415A. This is probably the most common cheap cam lock key in the US. The steel drawers in my service truck came keyed to C415A.