The Refind Binary File Is Missing Aborting Installation Manual. Preface: There's nothing nefarious here, nor is the information contained herein particularly helpful to thieves or the dishonest. A thief would just cut the dang thing open and be done with it. So I bought a fire safe to protect some documents that I wanted protected in the unlikely event of a house fire.

When I got the safe, I promptly emailed myself the manufacturer's code, set up an easily remembered user code, and stored the manual with the manufacturer's code in a 'safe place.' Fast forward two years. I need to get to one of the documents in the safe. I can't seem to remember the user code.

No problem, I say, I'll just look up the manufacturer's code in my email. So, what keywords did I use to make it searchable? Apparently not safe, combo, password, combination, or any combination or related word thereof. Ok, no problem, I'll just go get my manual from. Umm, nope, not in my drawer with user manuals, nor in my filing system. The combos are both lost for good.

So I start considering my options. I could send a notarized letter to the safe company, but where's the fun in that? I could open it destructively, but I didn't really want to do that either. The lock is an electronic combination with a five digit password, so brute forcing seems plausible, but there's a two minute lockout on 3 wrong combinations, taking the brute force time to 140 days.

Safe-cracking is the process of opening a safe without either the combination or key. 1 Physical methods. 1.1 Lock manipulation; 1.2 Guessing the combination; 1.3 Autodialers; 1.4 Weak-point drilling; 1.5 Scoping; 1.6 Brute force methods; 1.7 Radiological methods; 1.8 Tunneling into bank vaults; 1.9 Safe.

That won't work. I open up the battery compartment, enter three wrong combos, it goes into lockout mode, I remove the battery for a couple seconds and put it back.

Serial Windows Xp Starter Edition Sp3 here. Yep, it 'forgot' it was in lockout mode, and I can now enter 3 more passwords. Only 99,994 more to go. I estimate the safe could be opened in less than 6 days using brute force. I'm not in a real hurry for the documents, don't want to break the safe, and love the challenge of getting my safecracking on, so I commit to cracking this sucker via brute force. At first I considered a mechanical dialer that would punch the buttons for me, but the mechanics of doing that with acceptable speed seemed somewhat difficult - not an afternoon's kind of project. However, by cutting away a couple globs of hot glue with a blade, i could access the keypad contacts directly: Conveniently, there are access holes for connecting wires to the contact array.

So I start sketching up where I need jumper wires and placing them. Then it was a simple matter of using some relay boards I had laying around to start dialing the keypad using an arduino I also had laying around. I used a couple of photosensors to read the LED status indicators so that I could know if the combo failed or succeeded. Finally, I used an additional relay to power cycle the keypad after 3 failed combinations to defeat the lockout feature. With a little programming work, I had an automated dialer that should (!) stop when the correct combination was found. By logging each attempt on a laptop and writing a couple of little helper scripts, I had hourly status updates being delivered via email.

It was a bit of a programmer's nightmare in that I could not test the code directly for success, and didn't have the exact details of what the success scenario looked like, for example, how long until the green LED would light, how brightly it would light, or if it would be solid or flashing. Some youtubing failed to turn up these details as well. So I did my best to make it robust to these details and prayed. And prayed, and prayed, and prayed.

For five days, the robot dialed, and failed, and dialed again. When over 2/3 of the keyspace had been searched and no combination found, I started to doubt the success of the project. However, this morning at 7:09 am, one minute before my alarm usually goes off (weird coincidence), the phone on my nightstand buzzed with an email alert. It was the safecracking robot calling, saying it had found the correct code.

Somewhat scared of a false positive, I showered first, then headed into the room and removed the heavy blanket which I'd been using to muffle the incessant beeping. I entered the code sent via email and lo and behold, it opened. You can see a pen propping open the door in the lower left corner. I love it when a plan comes together.

With a little hot glue the keypad will go right back together and the safe will be like new. And this time my email with the combination will not be titled 'Remember this number'. *facepalm* Now, as a wisecracking friend said 'Dude, you can totally rob a bank now, at least when it's closed for a week'.

And when they are using cheap Walmart fire safes. Posts: 9 Joined: February 12th, 2011, 1:22 am. UAirLtd wrote:This is hacking at its finest: no frills, gets the job done. Also really well written. My hat off to you, sir. The delayed gratification of this project added an element of suspense which really made it fun when it hit paydirt and the safe opened. It had to be truly autonomous as there was no way I could monitor its progress even after maximizing the rate at which codes could be entered and minimizing the downtime of the power cycle.

I had all of that optimized down to 10 ms. That was all done through trial and error. I got the keypad put back together this evening, and the safe is like new again.

By the way, what do you think I found inside the safe? That's right, the manual with the printed code. *facepalm again* Posts: 9 Joined: February 12th, 2011, 1:22 am. Nor the long keys (that require huge amounts of combinations and so time). Plenty of ideas for v2 Right, brute force probably isn't the way on longer keys. Lol, I like this.

I read about a new spray that robbers use. They spray some film over the keypad and then can come back later and peel it off and can tell what buttons have been pressed by smudge prints. Or another way is to put a mini camera facing the keypad. Your way is much more fun though thanks for sharing your hack. Posts: 1 Joined: March 24th, 2016, 2:24 pm.

For years, you have always been told not to leave your valuables out in plain view when you leave your hotel room. Thefts of valuables from hotel rooms, while not rampant, are a real problem. Master keys and master key cards in the wrong hands make the thefts easier and faster.

See what happens when thieves gain access to a or use other methods to enter your hotel room when you are away. Your only choice () is to keep your valuables secure by placing them in your hotel room safe.

And while hotel in-room safes are a good place to secure your valuables (other than the front desk safe which is usually more secure and usually has more liability protection but less convenient) you can take additional measures to provide extra security to deny unauthorized access to your hotel room safe. How Does Hotel Room Safe Theft Happen? Theft from hotel in-room safes is not an everyday occurrence, but it does happen. Hotel guests do forget their safe codes or safe electronics may malfunction. Therefore, the hotel staff has to have some way to unlock the hotel room safe. Hotels all have a special “electronic backdoor” that allows them to use a special digital code, key or electronic device to open the safe if needed. So you are truly not the only one with access to your safe.

To prove how easy it is to break into a hotel room safe with simple tools, the below video shows that the metal nameplate on one brand of common hotel room safes can be easily removed revealing a backup keyhole underneath. Using nothing more than a simple pocket tool and a short length of wire, the safe can be easily opened. The interesting part is when the safe’s door is then closed, it automatically locks itself again like nothing’s happened. So when a traveler returns to their hotel room they’ll see the safe’s door closed and assume it’s locked and secure, when in reality some or all of the contents have been secretly stolen. This is just one way to open a hotel room safe knowledge, however, there other ways to open other style hotel room safes, depending on the safe manufacturer. With Simple Tools Solutions to Prevent Unauthorized Entry Of Your Hotel In-Room Safe There are only two products on the market that are portable, and can be used to stop unauthorized entry to your hotel room safe; they are at the end of this article. Obviously, there are a few things that we all know already.

First, we all know we can use the safe at the hotel’s front desk. By doing so offers more security, as well as better financial protection, as in some states in the USA, only front desk safes are covered under hotel liability. Secondly, we don’t have to put items of value in hotel room safes. However, both of these ideas are not too convenient. However, there are solutions that you can take with you. Currently, there are only two products on the market that can prevent this.

Milockie Hotel Safe Lock Use your own lock to prevent unauthorized entry The Milockie is a smaller device, and of a less robust scale. While it does keep your hotel safe door from being opened without your knowledge, it’s not built to the same strength standards as the Bloxsafe. The selling point of this device is its relatively small size and price point.. Most Common Types of Hotel Room Safes Electronic Keypad Room Safe This type of safe is commonly found in mainstream hotels and resorts and in many ways is the one that MAY have the least amount of thefts from it. That’s because it requires a handheld computer device to open the safe. These safes require the attachment of a handheld PDA, with either an infra-red USB or cable. The units store up to 50 entries, incorrect PIN entry, and it’s all time and date stamped.

These can be attached to a PC, where audit reports can be printed for police and insurance purposes. These units DO NOT have a hotel override, it reveals the guest PIN.

Electronic Keypad Safe With Keypad Override Access These types of hotel room safes require the use of an override *sequence*, not just a PIN number. This type of safe is almost as good as the one previously mentioned, as it contains a removable chip, which can access all the same data as above. Electronic Keypad Access With Manual Safety Key These room safes are not as secure as the previous two. This style requires the moving of the safe to enter a key and entering an override code. They record the time and date of the override entry, but nothing else. Refer below as to who *should* hold the spare key. Manual Key Safe With Safety Key Access This is a very old room safe model and is becoming rarer as time passes as hotels remodel and replace them with newer electronic versions.

Yes, they do have spare keys, but reputable hotels don’t keep them accessible – even to management. It’s often kept in a fire safe with either the general cashier or hotel management – we would hope – but many times who knows where this key is and who has access to it? Hotel Safes Always Have Pre-Determined Default Override PINs A story and video that was posted on YouTube made this claim and it could be very true, but is not believed to be a common occurrence. Since this video hit the internet, many hotel room safe manufacturers now generate a random default password which can be “000000” to prevent this in case the safe is accidentally locked during installation. If you are unsure of your hotel room’s safe security, and you want to use your hotel room safe, your best option is to consider using locking device. There are only two devices on the market that are portable that can help prevent unauthorized entry to your room safe.

These locks are similar, yet different in quality, size, and price. Click to read “Hotel Room Safe Theft Reports” Thefts from hotel safes usually involve dishonest hotel employees, and these types of thefts seem to have a higher rate of being reported in hotels outside the United States. To view many of these hotel in-room safe stories reported by travelers, click on this.

A common thread in these hotel in room safe theft reports is that they occurred in Mexico, South America, and Southern Europe, Spain, Canary Islands, Africa, and Asia. Here are a few videos that travelers have filmed showing how easy it is to open hotel safes with a simple master code or other means. Hotel Safe in Chicago Shows the Reset Switch Which Can be Easily Accessed.