Great piece (or at least what I skimmed through). However, I think this hypothesis is not well-founded:<p>> <i>I suspect the main reason for the disappearance of the craftsman criminal is simply that there are fewer and fewer people with the practical skills and confidence to even try to break into a safe. Engineering apprenticeships have been decimated, and even the old metalwork shops in schools have gone, replaced by ‘craft, design and technology’, which seems to mainly involve making things of cardboard.</i><p>As he mentions later in the piece, the rewards just aren't that great. Moreover, I think surveillance technology has reached a point where getting access to the safe is harder than cracking the safe itself. And that if you have the means to bypass the surveillance, then you have the sophistication needed to bypass the safe's physical locks without traditional safe-cracking.
Love a bit of Tim Hunkin. Anyone reading HackerNews would probably enjoy his television series from the early 90s: The Secret Life of Machines. Details, including links to download locations (bittorrent for preference I'd imagine) here: <a href="http://www.timhunkin.com/control/n_tv_index.htm" rel="nofollow">http://www.timhunkin.com/control/n_tv_index.htm</a>
In the past week I have been reading _Essays Ancient and Modern_ by Bernard Knox. In the autobiographical introduction, he writes of being trained for infiltration behind German lines in WW II, including a class with a master safe cracker, then an inmate of Pentonville Prison. Knox flunked, as having insufficiently sensitive fingers, and the safe cracker advised him to stick to dynamite. As matters worked out, Knox never had the chance to practice burglary, though he saw a good deal of action.
I hadn't previously seen this video, but it's a great insight into his slot machines. <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z9mkhI-KB_U" rel="nofollow">http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z9mkhI-KB_U</a>
I was shopping for safes a while ago. It's pretty amazing how bad the low-end safes (gun safes, in particular) are -- 12-16ga steel with some concrete. You can open one (destructively) with a heavy ax or sledge in a few minutes. Even when the door is something semi-acceptable (1/4" steel plate), it's often the only part, with the body of the safe being much lighter.
"In the last twenty years, the craft of safe cracking has tragically declined."<p>No kidding, bank accounts with proliferation of various ways money is transferred and stored - budding criminals and kids who want to play mischief - look to the internet now. Cracking safes is so quaint.
From the title “Illegal Engineering”, I thought this would be about titling yourself a “Professional Engineer” in Canada and similar countries, where calling yourself that without a professional engineering license is illegal. <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Regulation_and_licensure_in_engineering#Canada" rel="nofollow">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Regulation_and_licensure_in_eng...</a><p>I don’t mind reading about safe-cracking, but it’s a little disappointing that the article never talks about when safe-cracking is illegal, or how specifically it relates to engineering. The title doesn’t fit.
In the article there are some references to medieval locks.<p>I was impressed to see early roman (Pompeian and Herculaneum) era locks. If anyone is interested this query served me <a href="https://www.google.com/search?q=ancient+%22roman+OR+pompeian%22+key+lock" rel="nofollow">https://www.google.com/search?q=ancient+%22roman+OR+pompeian...</a>