Security of the Southside Halls of Residence

Freddie Witherden

It all seemed rather impressive: swipe cards, RFID, strange 
looking keyholes and a security guard on-hand to testify about 
the impressive security of the Southside `complex'. At least that 
is how it was presented during freshers week. We were told that 
so long as our doors were shut correctly that it was almost 
impossible to break in and that all burglaries thus-far had been 
as a result of students not shutting their doors.

So that's exactly what the 350+ freshers living in Southside did 
— in the belief that they were secure. Of course, it was not long 
before the more astute students realised that it was 
theoretically possible to open the doors using a credit card. A 
Hollywood favourite shimming is a lock-bypass technique whereby a 
flexible object — such as a credit card — is slid in between the 
door and the frame and used to manipulate the latch. For this to 
work two conditions must be satisfied.

Firstly, the door can not be dead bolted, which is when bolt is 
connected directly to the locking cylinder. Thus the only way to 
move the bolt is to rotate the cylinder — which requires the key 
to be inserted. Although most house locks are dead bolted those 
in Southside are not. This is as a result of the swipe card 
access system. (In order for the doors to automatically lock when 
closed the latch must always be free to move.)

Secondly, there must be sufficient space between the frame and 
the door to allow a shim to be inserted. Although this should 
never be the case there is no substitute for shoddy workmanship, 
as I will get into later.

While you occasionally heard stories of someone in another 
Southside hall managing to get into their rooms using a credit 
card, few took them seriously, assuming that his/her door had 
shifted significantly to make it possible. Until, that is, I 
tried it myself.

After five minutes R&D with a fellow Physicist and an empty coke 
can we had created our own shim. Being made of aluminium it was a 
good deal thinner than a credit card and much better shaped. 
Using this we were able to open (with permission, naturally) over 
70% of the doors we tried. Usually the entire process, from 
inserting the shim to opening the door takes a smidgeon under 
five seconds. Five seconds!

Some of the doors are so bad that it is possible to open them by 
wedging an unfolded Tropicana carton in between the door and the 
frame and jiggling it around for a few seconds.

But, there's more. Each person in Southside has a lockable drawer 
in their wardrobe. Perfect for valuables, such as cash, passports 
&c — or so we thought. Sadly the locks used on these drawers are 
some of the poorest I have come across in my two years of 
picking. In lock-jargon terms: the locks have an open rectangular 
keyhole with a single row of three pins; none of which are 
security pins.

With a set of lock picks it is possible to open any of the 
drawers in Southside in under ten seconds, on average. However to 
add insult to injury, so to speak, it is possible to open them in 
a similar amount of time using nothing but a screwdriver and 
metal paper clip. Although those with any experience picking 
locks normally frown at the use of paper clips (on most real 
locks they are useless) the locks in Southside are so 
exceptionally poor that they are actually a valid option.

It is a somewhat disturbing thought that a would-be burglar needs 
nothing more than a folded up coke can, a screwdriver and a paper 
clip to be able to successfully mount an crime spree on most of 
the rooms in Southside. Moreover with tailgating into the 
building as easy as it is this is something of a real concern for 
both myself and others who I have talked to on the issue.

So, what can be done about all of this? Well, in the short term, 
very little. Thankfully with only one week left and very few (if 
any) robberies this year us Southside residents can consider 
ourselves lucky.

In the long term security and residency will need to look at each 
and every door in Southside and see if it is vulnerable to 
shimming. If this is the case then the door will need to be 
reseated such that it is impossible to insert a shim.

If nothing is done then I would not be surprised if by the time 
next years lambs come to the slaughter (I mean, err, freshers) 
that over 85% of the doors could be susceptible to shimming. This 
is because Southside appears to be either (depending on who you 
talk to) still settling or subsiding; resulting in ever larger 
gaps between doors and frames.

As for the lockable drawers, my personal recommendation is that 
locks on each drawer are changed to something more substantial. 
It is somewhat ironic that the locks on the doors — which are 
seldom used — are some of the best in the industry (jargon: 
Mul-T-lock Classic dimple locks featuring pins-in-pins, layman: 
reasonably difficult to pick) while the drawer locks are some of 
the worst available.

Finally, what does this mean for the new Eastside halls? While I 
have not visited Eastside yet I would not be surprised if it uses 
the same set-up as Southside and so is also likely to be equally 
vulnerable.