Less. Look at any Lockpicking Lawyer video on YouTube as he demonstrates in real time how bad they are. Most of his videos are under 5 min
If you want to really turn yourself off smart locks check out any DefCon talk about smart locks or “smart” devices in general.
And most dumb locks can also be picked in under 5 minutes. The difference is a smart lock can alert me when someone who isn’t me opens the door or leaves it open. Of course, most burglars are just going to break a window to get in.
There should be a separation between fully mechanical locks with electronic monitoring (ideal) and a mechanical lock with vital electronic components.
You can get a lot of locks which allows you to connect external mechanisms which can do just that. Don’t know anything ready out of the box, though
I just watched LPL pick a smart lock with no keyhole. He just had to shove a bit of wire in the drain hole at the bottom. 🤦♂️
A previous owner of my apartment had for some reason installed a high security door. It’s 5 inches thick with steel plates inside and has 3 separate sets of 3 locking rods like a bank vault. Not sure what line of work they were in but, really, good luck to the person who thinks they can break in here easily. Downside is there is no way to put a digital lock on the sucker.
I would be worrying about fire fighters won’t be able to enter my apt when they need to.
You want them to break in for insurance purposes though, it’s a clear indication of unauthorized entry. Your policy should cover the door/window, but if your lock gets picked/bypassed you’re going to have a rough time getting things covered.
My smart lock doesn’t change the locking mechanisms. It’s basically a robot on the inside that turns the lock like you would. The only security issue would have to be software side, which a typical thief isn’t going to bother with especially since you cost tell from the outside that’s it’s not a normal lock - because it is.
August lock btw.
I agree that most thieves won’t bother - but they do now have the additional option to hack it, making the lock less secure in total, not to mention the flawed mechanical design many of those smart locks have.
Yeah I’m just saying in my case they have no way of seeing that it’s a smart lock at all. The only smart part is an attachment on the interior side. So mechanically it’s 100% the same, and there is no visible indication that is “hackable,” even if it were. My door and it’s lock look as just like it did 15 years ago.
most of the smart locks that are supposed to be drop in replacements for traditional locks are mostly trash.
Personally been eyeing upgrading to UI’s access readers, but it lacks features like door unlock with Apple Homekey (for now anyways since it requires some specialty hardware). So been holding off.
This particular product is geared towards small business and large enterprises. But can be setup for home usage if you have to technical expertise.
If there is no keyhole to pick then it is probably marginally more secure, but if a burglar wants to get into your home then no door lock is going to stop them. They could just break it or break your windows.
This is it. The weakest part of most doors is the door. A sledge hammer will go through a door or window regardless of the lock.
Smart locks are way more convenient and the ability to grant timed access and unique access controls probably makes them more secure.
If you’re caught with a lock pick, or sledge hammer or saw all, that establishes intent. You’ll do more time. Of course that’s a huge “if”
They could just break it or break your windows.
This is why you need backup measures. For example, if they break in through my windows, they’ll be foiled by the micromachines I placed strategically on the floor. If they break through the door, they’ll have to contend with the blowtorch I have rigged just inside the entryway. Always remember, “this is my house, I have to defend it.”
What if you’re in another city that your uncle happens to live in and his house is being renovated, would you still be able to defend it?
If they manage to get past that, you should attach a paint can to some rope and have it rigged to swing towards them if they are coming up the stairs.
Just leave some Lego on the ground. Perfectly legal, yet instantly lethal to anyone who steps on it.
We have steel doors and protection metal bars in the windows in LATAM (yep, our houses are little fortress) and even that would not stop the most dedicated burglars…
You know, I feel cameras help even more, these scums get anxiety when they see cameras lol.
Against what sort of attack? Who’s the attacker? What capabilities do they have? What do they want?
There’s a saying, “locks are to keep your friends out.” If someone really means you harm, a lock is not going to keep them out: they can smash a window, break down the door, or hit you with a rubber hose until you give them your keys or passwords. This applies no matter what kind of lock you have.
But a lock represents a social barrier: everyone knows that trying to defeat someone else’s lock is a hostile act. The law recognizes this in many places: breaking-and-entering is a more severe crime than trespassing.
A lock may slow down an attacker. It may redirect an attacker to go after your neighbor’s stuff instead of your stuff — but not if everyone has locks.
A password lock has some advantages over a key lock. You don’t have to issue physical keys to everyone you want to allow in. Many allow you to create and revoke passwords separately — so you can grant a friend access to your house while you’re away, and then revoke it when they no longer need it.
However, a password lock also has some disadvantages. If you give a password to one person, that person can easily give it to everyone. That’s a lot harder with a physical key, because they’d have to go make a lot of copies of that key — which, if nothing else, costs money and time.
A computerized lock can create an audit trail: it can record when it was opened, and even which credentials (passwords, keys, …) were used to unlock it.
Any lock can have vulnerabilities — most common key locks can be picked; computerized locks can be attacked through their computer hardware or software.
Thanks for reminding me of this XKCD gem!
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rubber-hose_cryptanalysis
In cryptography, rubber-hose cryptanalysis is a euphemism for the extraction of cryptographic secrets (e.g. the password to an encrypted file) from a person by coercion or torture—such as beating that person with a rubber hose, hence the name—in contrast to a mathematical or technical cryptanalytic attack.
It is for a house in a residential area, and I don’t keep a lot of valuables in the house. I wish I knew who the attacker would be, so I can catch them with pre-crime.
If you’re concerned about burglars, one problem is that if they decide to hit your house, they can just break a window.
Where I live, burglars often hit cars rather than houses; and they’re very willing to break windows to get in, especially if they see something valuable in the car. They spend no time trying to defeat the locks — hell, some don’t even check if the car is locked. They’re pros; they’ve practiced smashing a window and looting the car quickly.
A lot of the loss due to burglary is the damage the burglar does on the way in, rather than the value of the things stolen. And upgrading locks does nothing to reduce this.
Maybe instead of upgrading your locks, you might be better off spending the same amount of money upgrading your insurance?
Are you an insurance salesman? Because this script probably would have worked on me!
Cars have historically been broken into and stolen a lot. Thus auto makers have put extra effort into good locks. Some hardware store deadbolts are so bad you anyone can pick them with lock picks - no instructions needed. Only the best deadbolts are equal what a car has. Likewise breaking a car window is typically harder than breaking a house window.
I love my August smart lock. It auto-unlocks my door when I get home, so I never need keys or to reach for my phone. It also has a key pad to unlock if I dont have my phone. It has alerts and reports status on an app. I can unlock or lock the door remotely for people to check in on things for me while Im away.
Yes, it has issues and eats batteries, but its so convenient.
Oh, I did that for a while. 2001 was a mess of a year … right after the planes started flying again after 9/11, the Nimda worm came out.
Yeah that was a rough time indeed. I recall getting hit with a couple of those big worms back to back.
They have a regular backup cylinder that has all the vulnerabilities of a regular lock.
On top of that they have a bunch of electronics that can be vulnerable.
I can’t see how it would be possible for them to be more secure unless you’re someone who leaves their keys around a lot and a smart lock would let you not have a key on you.
Anything with added complexity will have a larger attack surface and more failure modes.
I have to disagree - this is more like the gate that blocks the sidewalk that you can get around by walking on the grass. The mechanical locks that these come with are significantly weaker, more common and better understood by thieves, that they wouldn’t bother even trying to figure out how to hack the smart lock.
That doesn’t invalidate their point. The electronic lock is just an additional potential point of failure with no added security. In addition to people who can pick or break the key lock, now there is an additional type of person who can break in: the kind that knows how to bypass electronic locks.
Same concept but why pick a lock when you can break a window or sliding glass door?
In other words… The attack surface is indeed larger for smart lock than dumb lock – more ways to attack – but in practice it matters little because existing home attack surface is easily breached.
Honestly, the lock is one of the last things to worry about. If you have an outward opening door get security pins for your hinges.
Check out one of https://m.youtube.com/@DeviantOllam talk on door security and worry less about the lock and more about the door fixture. His hour long conference talks to through how a door is insecure how it can be exploited and what you can do to prevent it from happening.
Typically, external residential doors open inwards so that they can’t be blocked by someone on the outside. Of course this doesn’t apply if we’re talking about an internal or non-residential door.
