Ask the lockpicking lawyer. He regularly opens them on YouTube. On the other hand, he opens about anything. But those “smart” locks usually have additional weaknesses.
It’s why I went with an inside only smart lock (I have an August that’s been running like a champ for half a decade). A door lock is a deterrent in the first place, and I don’t expect it to ever stop someone sufficiently motivated. Hell, I broke through an exterior door by accident when I was a young teen - haven’t trusted them since.
However, if some cheat came out (like some of LPL’s “just hold a powerful magnet” locks) I’d rather not have an obvious smart lock that can be picked out from the street.
A smart lock with a keyhole is never going to be more secure than a standard key lock as it is a standard key lock. Now that being said if the door will let you know every time its opened you could possibly head something off
I got a smart lock after realizing that we would simply forget to lock the front door sometimes since we typically leave via the garage. It’s connected to Home Assistant and now will lock automatically if no one is home.
Technically, I know that a smart lock is less secure, but in most real world scenarios, knowing that the lock will be locked when we are not home, on top of being notified if it becomes unlocked, I’d argue that it’s more secure now than when I had a dumb lock.
I know it sounds crazy but what I would really like is a smart lock built into the wall and wired up to electric and the bolt would go into a hollow in the door. Sorta reverse of a standard door lock. Problem is since its not standard it would be way more expensive. Its like something I would do if I was rich enough for money to not be an issue.
A dog with a loud bark will always be more effective than any lock or security system. My border collie is a super lovable dog but her bark is designed to scare off wolves. It’s sounds mean and scary. Truly one whose bark is worse than the bite. She hasn’t ever bit a human but she pinned a pit bull that challenged her and gave him a bite to remember.
A lock is never weaker than a window. If someone wants in your house, there are ways that don’t have anything to do with your locks. Locks of any quality largely work by deterrence, rather than actual pickability or durability. If I have to literally break something to get in, I’m drawing attention to myself and immediately putting a count down on my robbery before a cop shows up or witnesses get a better look at me, my vehicle, etc. So it’s already not worth it for most petty thieves.
when some thieves broke into my neighbors house they first rang the door bell a few times to make sure no one was home, after that they hopped the fence and went window to window until they found one that was unlocked and went in that way
Haha the dudes that broke in left a big knife on their pillow too not sure if they actually would have used it or was just as a scare tactic, they were like two high school aged dudes that most likely were the kids who lived across the street
A broken window is clear indication of theft for insurance purposes. If your lock gets picked, you might be fucked depending on how your policy is written.
I worked for a company that designed home security devices for a few years… Pretty much everyone i talked to agreed there is only 1 actually good security device that is an effective deterrent. Its called “Large Scary Dog”. Every other device is there just to notify you that all your shit is soon to be or already gone.
On the other hand, these digital locks, while not any safer, are much more convenient. I am all in on not having to carry keys and instead have a code to enter or some other easy access.
Usually there is a warning that the battery is dying well ahead of it actually being dead. One that can send notifications will ping your phone with a low battery message. Others have audible warnings. You unlock it and then it starts beeping at you. It keeps doing that until you either change the batteries or it eventually dies. But you have to do a lot of ignoring for it to die on you. Many do have key backups too though. Just in case
There are ones like August that only add the smart lock on one side and retain the old hardware on the outside. If the battery runs out you just gotta use your key like a plebian. It warns you ahead of time it’s low though and I’ve never had it fail in the half decade I’ve had it.
So, disregarding physical brute force (because that lock bypass method will never change), let's say a smart lock today is functionally equivalent to a traditional lock in terms of security. How's that smart lock going to look in 5 years? In 10? When is the manufacturer going to abandon the product and stop providing security updates? It's only a matter of time before whatever firmware it shipped with becomes obsolete. And then it's just one more thing on the list of pwnd devices that unscrupulous actors can access at will. Your friendly neighborhood junkie in search of quick cash might not know the difference, but a list of people that have e-Lock v2.2 would be very lucrative to the types of people that run the current smash and grab operations.
Soft/firmware obsolescence is a thing with any "smart" device, but it becomes especially egregious when it's built into what are traditionally durable devices like appliances. And even more so when it's something embedded, like a lock, outlet, etc. It becomes "replace that light fixture, or leave that vulnerability on the network." A lock takes that from "someone can waltz into my home network" to "someone can waltz through my front door."
Don't let it use the manufacturer's cloud service, but use your own local server (like Home Assistant) accessible only through VPN (Wireguard, Tailscale), keep your home router up to date. This alone eliminates the largest attack surfaces and offers way more privacy.
It’s important to remember that no lock is entirely unpickable. It’s just a matter of time, skill, tools, and know-how. Generally speaking, if someone is willing to pick a lock, they will be able to pick your lock eventually.
But arguably even more importantly, most people do not possess the skill, tools or know-how to pick a lock and will not try. So you get the same benefit from just about ANY lock for the vast majority of people that might break into your home, in that any functioning lock will deter them equally.
Also, even if you have the most secure door locks known to man, even if they are literally unpickable, that will not keep motivated people from entering your home through other means. Having a perfectly secure lock just means that it become preferable for them to break in through a window, by literally breaking in a door, by your crawlspace/basement access, etc. They could also catch you outside the home and use you to gain access by threat, trickery or theft of your keys.
So, to me, even if a smart lock is less secure than a standard lock they are both going to act as sufficient deterrence for most situations and the tangential benefits of a smart lock can be worth the marginal loss of security. But that’s a choice you have to make for yourself.
Edit: Also, some features can make smart locks massively more beneficial to addressing a break in attempt even while being easier to actually break in. For example, there are can be some secret distress features, like a alert combination that unlocks the door but also secretly alerts the police of a break in. Or notifications that alert you that the door was unlocked even when you aren’t home. Smart locks come with vulnerabilities, yes. But also unique features that you can’t get with conventional locks.
It’s more secure as in I can’t forget to not lock the door, since it auto-locks. Also I can’t lock myself out of the house if I leave my keys inside, which I have done in the past lol. As the other nerds in here have said, it probably won’t keep you any safer against people breaking in though, but I think of it in terms of convenience.
I pick locks as a hobby. Your door lock is almost never the point of attack. It’s way easier to break the door or windows. Only time picking would be useful is if you need to conceal that you’ve entered, which burglars don’t typically care about.
How bad some of the “secure” backup locks are or the failsafe mechanics of those or even just the software of not even cheap products are most of the time real bad and just adds more fail points.
well, what do you do if it runs out of battery? electric locks really only make sense on gates and doors in apartment blocks, where it’s okay to have it just default to open in case of failure.
Fun fact, broken windows very rarely alert neighbors to a burglary. They’re not terrible at alerting the home owner, but unless a neighbor connects a second, overtly thievish sound to the crack of broken glass, they will usually go about their day. It’s not even the bystander effect, most people just don’t know what a burglary sounds like.
I put that 3M film on all my accessible windows and doors. It takes 3-4 hits with a sledge to get through. Thieves don't come prepaired for that and even if they are, the alarm would go off on the first hit. It's also a very loud noise and an extra minute of smashing on a populated downtown street. Well worth the extra cost.
One thing people aren’t considering is that if we assume that it’s relatively trivial to bypass either a classic lock or a smart lock, only one of the two is likely to give your phone a notification that it’s been opened in your absence.
Do they have a small battery? Because it is a common practice to cut down electricity when someone intends to break in your house, even with that backup source of power I guess the lack of electricity would mean no Internet anyway.
Mine runs on 4x AA batteries, which lasts a very long time. On the order of a year. Cutting electricity would indeed prevent the notification, but a dumb lock couldn’t send one even with all the power in the world.
Plus, in a shared apartment/condo building the power is much less likely to be cut and in a freestanding home one could theoretically put their network on a UPS so any notifications would still go out.
freestanding home one could theoretically put their network on a UPS so any notifications would still go out.
I have a UPS attached to my Synology NAS, and every time the unit is triggered it sends a notification (kinda, now that I think about it, how is it sent if no power electricity 🤔) so the NAS advises me that can’t ping to Synology after several minutes, is that what you mean?
I mean that if you have a cable modem and wireless router on a UPS, your internet should stay up unless the burglar also cuts the cable (much less likely).
Ahh yeah, that was me overthinking, pretty neat simple solution I have been wanting to do that since forever, hopefully a robber won’t be the cause of me finally doing it 😅
Haha yeah, the whole thing is a risk calculation that you can take all the way down the rabbit hole. But having network on UPS has other uses too, at least.
feddit.uk
Hot