Crime

What Are Americans Most Afraid Of?

A recent survey asked 1,500 Americans what they fear most. The answers may surprise you. The nationwide survey was conducted by researchers at Chapman University, the results of which can be found here. It’s considered the first comprehensive nationwide study of what strikes fear in Americans, and it’s the first of what is planned to…

This $150 Hack Can Crack a Safe

It might not look much, with its plain 3D printed arms and cables hanging free, but this little guy can punch well above its weight. Made up of components worth an estimated $150, this auto-dialler can do the same job as a machine worth tens of thousands: it can crack a safe. The expensive machines…

Why the City of Oakland Finally Legalized Pinball Machines

Everyone has tried it at some point. The authorities started turning a blind eye years ago, but it wasn’t officially legalized until the summer of 2014. Finally, after more than 80 years of illegitimacy, the City of Oakland has legalized…pinball machines. https://soundcloud.com/roman-mars/99-… Pinball’s design history can help explain why it was illegal for so long.…

Crooks Have Started Rooting ATMs to Steal Cash

As if we don’t already have it bad with ATM skimmers, criminals have now started going a step further. New reports suggest that ATMs are increasingly being rooted so that crooks can take complete control of cash points and easily steal funds. Security firms Kaspersky and Interpol have announced that criminals have begun to install…

Argentina Is Using Drones to Hunt Down Tax-Evading Mansions

Officials in Argentina had a sneaking suspicion about property tax evasion, so they sent sent out some camera-equipped drones to look at a mostly-vacant part of town. What’d they find? Oh, just 200 luxury houses that hadn’t been registered, according to the Telegraph. That’s pretty flagrant. The $10,000 unmanned aircraft, often used by security forces,…

Report: Border Patrol Will Test Wearable Cameras for Agents

U.S. Border Patrol will begin wearing cameras in training, according to the AP. The move comes as the border patrol has come under fire for killings by agents. This is just the latest sign that movement to strap cameras to law enforcement is picking up steam. http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2014/09/14/border-deaths-agents-transparency/15629919/ According to the AP, Border Patrol chief R.…

Police Hope 3D Printing Can Help Solve A 1996 Homicide Case

On August 9, 1996, Kobayashi Junko, a 21-year-old senior studying at Sophia University, was murdered in his home in Katsushika-Ku, Tokyo. Today, 18 years later, the Tokyo Metropolitan Police are working with 3D printing technicians to recreate the scene of the crime. As the news site 3Ders.org reports, police were able to conclude that Kobayashi…

The Coldest Case: Using DNA to Identify Century-Old Remains

In a dusty, seemingly empty field 60 miles east of L.A., Dr. Alexis Gray, a forensic anthropologist from the San Bernardino County Sheriff Department, points to a chain-link fence far in the distance, the mountains rising beyond in the hazy heat. “There are 7,000 people between us and that next fence there,” she says. For…

Come Chat with America’s Greatest Convicted Counterfeiter

This week, the Secret Service busted the counterfeit ring behind some $77 million in fake bills. Makes you think. How on Earth could anyone print that much paper? And how did they make the money so convincing? Arthur Williams, Jr. has a pretty good idea. Williams is a master counterfeiter who was recently released from…

The Rise and Fall of America’s Greatest Convicted Counterfeiter

Art Williams Jr. says he never really knew how money worked until he went to prison three times. It’s ironic because Art Williams is also one of the most infamous money counterfeiters in recent American history. And he almost got away with it. The Chicago native is best known for cracking the 1996 series $100…

A Counterfeit Ring Behind $77 Million in Fake Bills Finally Got Busted

For years, the Secret Service has been tracking down the legendary “Russian-Israeli Note,” one of the most sophisticated and common fake Benjamins ever made. This high-tech international ring was finally busted and indicted this week, thanks to years of good old-fashioned surveillance and legwork. The lucky break in the case came back in May 2012,…

Gmail Scans Caught a Sex Offender Who Left No Trace Elsewhere Online

We all know that our Gmail inboxes are scanned, and that Google uses automated image scanning to track down child exploitation—but it’s now been made clear the two overlap: searches of a Gmail inbox have led the arrest of a registered sex offender who has illegal photos of children in his email account. News reports…

Would You Notice A Massive Increase In Police Presence?

Let’s say the police patrol presence in your area was tripled. Would you feel safer? If you were a criminal, would be feel more afraid? A now-infamous year-long study showed that most likely you wouldn’t even notice. In 1972, the police in Kansas City, Missouri, tried a year-long experiment to see how random police patrols…

Veteran Pickpocket Explains How ATM Skimmers Are Ruining His Craft

There’s no better example of a petty criminal than the pickpocket, a fast-moving talent who lifts wallets as if he were picking up pennies off the sidewalk. But a profile of a veteran pickpocket in the New York Times this weekend shows that technology is destroying the art. Credit cards are just more lucrative. It’s…

The Latest Super-Thin ATM Skimmers Are Virtually Unspottable

Just like consumer tech, criminal tech advances in leaps and bounds—and none more so than the ATM skimmer. Now, the kinds of skimmers being used are so slim and small that you’ll never see them—and their battery life means they last an age, too. Krebs on Security has a round-up of some of the miniaturized…

Pizza Shop: We’re Being Extorted For Bitcoin. What’s a Bitcoin?

Bitcoin, the preferred currency of hackers, fraudsters, and e-based ruffians everywhere, is now being extorted right in your own backyard—from your local pizza joint, specifically. Now the owners just need to figure out what a bitcoin actually is. First reported by Krebs on Security, the official “notices of extortion” were sent via snail mail to…

If You Want to Understand Cities in the 21st Century, Read This Essay

In 2008, a young model from rural Canada was brutally murdered in a Shanghai apartment building. The story of how her assailant was (maybe) caught, chronicled by journalist Mara Hvistendahl her engrossing essay And the City Swallowed Them, reveals how 21st century cities are changing the world. What seems like a cut-and-dried crime story becomes,…

As genetic profiling makes exonerations more prevalent, many states have adopted laws to compensate the wrongly convicted. Texas leads the nation by paying such persons $80,000 per year they were incarcerated. But 21 states have no such statutes yet, leaving them wide open for lawsuits and possibly higher payouts.

Violent crime is down in Denver since Colorado legalized marijuana. Data shows murders, assaults and burglaries declined during the first three months of the year, compared with the same period for 2013. Some opponents, however, say the criminal effect of decriminalizing marijuana won’t be felt for several years

Report: There’s a New Chinese Hacker Army Attacking the U.S.

A report by security company CrowdStrike claims that a new Shanghai-based cyberattack unit, with links to the People’s Liberation Army in China, has been hacking the U.S.. The group—codenamed “Putter Panda” because it often preys on golf-playing conference attendees—is believed to have been in existence since 2007. Over the past seven years, it’s claimed the…