Thieves Use Vacuum To Siphon Cash From Safes

Tootech writes "A gang of thieves armed with a powerful vacuum cleaner that sucks cash from supermarket safes has struck for the fifteenth time in France. The burglars broke into their latest store near Paris and drilled a hole in the pneumatic tube that siphons money from the checkout to the strong-room. They then sucked rolls of cash totaling £60,000 from the safe without even having to break its lock. Police said the gang — dubbed the Vacuum Burglars — always raid Monoprix supermarkets and have hit 15 of the stores branches around Paris in the past four years. A spokesman added: 'They spotted a weakness in the company's security system and have been exploiting it ever since.'"

Comments

You can make this stuff up.

[suso]

Sounds like someone has been watching "How To Beat The High Co$t Of Living". Anyone remember that movie? Similar plot, only it was a big bubble holding $1 million in cash in the middle of a shopping mall.

Re:You can make this stuff up.

[Anonymous Coward]

That's it. We should ban vacuums.

Re:You can make this stuff up.

[mapkinase]

Search google news for robbers paris vacuum and the only story you will find is from this The Sun tabloid.

I smell hoax

Re:You can make this stuff up.

[Rhaban]

try searching cambrioleurs aspirateur monoprix.

Re:You can make this stuff up.

[mapkinase]

Two (2) sources. Not very convincing.

The same about reporting it in Register and other one(1) source in UK.

Re:You can make this stuff up.

[cmiller173]

Wouldn't a government required registration of vacuums be sufficient?

Re:You can make this stuff up.

[TheWanderingHermit]

It goes back even more, to the 1960s or 1970s, in the "Casino" episode of Mission: Impossible (the real one, the good one, not that crap with the self-aggrandizing Tom Cruise). They drilled into a vault and ran a vacuum to suck out all the money.

Re:You can make this stuff up.

[somersault]

Two? There are over 4000 results for that search string, and the first page is all French news sites (apart from Slashdot, of course) covering this story..

Re:You can make this stuff up.

[ArsenneLupin]

Try searching just for aspirateur monoprix (i.e. without cambrioleurs). Plenty of hits, some even with pictures, and all of them about the gang (... and none about the vacuum cleaners that monoprix might be selling...)

Re:You can make this stuff up.

[Anonymous Coward]

No it's not :

http://www.lemonde.fr/societe/article/2010/09/22/le-gang-a-l-aspirateur-a-encore-frappe_1414885_3224.html

Re:You can make this stuff up.

[mapkinase]

Apparently, we are looking at different searches:

http://www.google.com/search?q=cambrioleurs+aspirateur+monoprix&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8&aq=t&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official&client=firefox-a#q=cambrioleurs+aspirateur+monoprix&hl=en&client=firefox-a&hs=gdU&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official&prmd=iv&source=lnms&tbs=nws:1&ei=ZbWcTJKPLITGlQeY2PGXCg&sa=X&oi=mode_link&ct=mode&ved=0CAoQ_AU&prmdo=1&fp=4e781b66e30e329a

Gives at my screen:

#
Conte d'automne : les 2 Brigands et l'Aspirateur magique

Documentissime.fr (Blog) - 1 day ago
Vol à l'aspirateur lundi 20 septembre au Monoprix de Saint-Ouen. Les deux complices ont emporté 70 000 euros. Les cambrioleurs utilisent le même mode ...
Seine-Saint-Denis. Ils vident les coffres avec un aspirateur - LaDépêche.fr
Le gang à l'aspirateur dévalise les Monoprix - Le Parisien
Seine-Saint-Denis un braquage avec un aspirateur - Sur Le Feu
Le Monde - 20minutes.fr
all 24 news articles
Ouest-France
#
Les beaux faits-divers de la presse française

France24 - 2 days ago
Le gang des aspirateurs qui a encore frappé, ou encore L'Homme qui se prétend père d'une ... Leur cible particulière, les magasins de l'enseigne Monoprix. ...

Re:You can make this stuff up.

[Eunuchswear]

From Le Parisien, 27/12/2009.

http://www.leparisien.fr/faits-divers/un-gang-de-cambrioleurs-devalise-les-monoprix-27-12-2009-757296.php

"Le dernier fait en date remonte à la nuit du 23 au 24 novembre, avenue d'Italie dans le XIII e arrondissement de Paris."

It's my local Monoprix!

(It's in Paris, not "near Paris").

Re:You can make this stuff up.

[somersault]

It does look like it: http://www.google.co.uk/search?source=ig&hl=en&rlz=&q=cambrioleurs+aspirateur+monoprix&btnG=Google+Search&aq=f&aqi=&aql=&oq=&gs_rfai=

Perhaps Americans get offended when they see French websites?

Re:You can make this stuff up.

[Anonymous Coward]

I dont remember that one, but I do remember the one where they drilled under a vault of gold, ran up a heating coil, melted the gold and had it drop out the bottom, and put it back into classic bar molds. Then they ran up a spraypaint can and repainted the vault so it wasn't obvious how they got the gold.

Re:You can make this stuff up.

[Eunuchswear]

Aha, they struck again!

http://www.leparisien.fr/faits-divers/le-gang-a-l-aspirateur-devalise-les-monoprix-22-09-2010-1078047.php

"Le dernier fait en date remonte à lundi. Vers 6 h 30, deux hommes pénètrent par une issue de secours dans les locaux du magasin Monoprix de la rue Garibaldi, à Saint-Ouen."

This one is "near Paris".

Re:You can make this stuff up.

[mapkinase]

6 results, 24 news articles - same number (I check it probably 6 times already today - one per each comment like yours). Not very impressive and below my personal threshold of belief at Google News.

I am starting to think that French sources are underrepresnted at Google in US (they do this foggy localization stuff).

Re:You can make this stuff up.

[somersault]

Ah, I missed where you were using Google News rather than just Google. Still, 24 news articles is not 2.. it does sound like a bad joke, but I wouldn't be that shocked if it were true.

Re:You can make this stuff up.

[kd5zex]

What is really needed is a registration of all vacuums and a complete ban on any vacuum capable of developing more than a 50 mbar vacuum, those having a debris capacity larger than 0.1 m3, or having a suction line larger than 25 mm.

Citizens will have 30 days to register / surrender vacuums or face a penalty of up to 500 euros.

Law enforcement and other government officials shall be exempt from registration and be allowed to posses banned vacuums.

Re:You can make this stuff up.

[mapkinase]

Nope. Click on "News" tab on the left:

http://www.google.co.uk/search?q=cambrioleurs+aspirateur+monoprix&hl=en&source=lnms&tbs=nws:1&ei=H7icTI6wG8KBlAe0-ISnCg&sa=X&oi=mode_link&ct=mode&ved=0CA0Q_AU&prmdo=1

Same 24 results. I guess the number of news outlets that bought this reached the saturation level. :-)

I still do not know if it is true or not. My initial reporting was to raise doubt and concern, not to reject the story.

I do "smell the hoax", but I still did not taste it.

Re:You can make this stuff up.

[Abstrackt]

That's it. We should ban vacuums.

That idea sucks.

Re:You can make this stuff up.

[mapkinase]

Finally, an explanation emerges: if it is old news, then no wonder that only 24 news outlets reporting it now:

here is Google Translate:

http://translate.google.com/translate?js=n&prev=_t&hl=en&ie=UTF-8&layout=2&eotf=1&sl=auto&tl=en&u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.leparisien.fr%2Ffaits-divers%2Fun-gang-de-cambrioleurs-devalise-les-monoprix-27-12-2009-757296.php

Looks like Sun and others bought old news as new news.

Re:You can make this stuff up.

[Anonymous Coward]

Only the law abiding suffer with these regulations. They do nothing to stop criminals determined to use vacuums.

Re:You can make this stuff up.

[Lumpy]

No..

declare only terrorists own vacuums..

Then point out to the moron senators that space is full of vacuum and we should declare war on it.

Suddenly NASA has all the money it needs.

Re:You can make this stuff up.

[Lumpy]

Merde Pute!

Re:You can make this stuff up.

[kd5zex]

"Law abiding" citizens have no need for such powerful vacuums. In fact, evidence has shown that people who own these high-power, high capacity vacuums are quite often linked to racist hate groups.

Re:You can make this stuff up.

[Anonymous Coward]

And among those 24 same sources we get in France, Le Parisien, Le Monde, and a few of the biggest newspapers in the country. What's your point? Besides, this is local Île-de-France news, and probably wasn't covered nationally as of today.

Re:You can make this stuff up.

[fire113]

Only in Canada eh. Oh, and it'll cost $1B and not be effective.

Re:You can make this stuff up.

[Mister Whirly]

So 24 different news stories is not enough to make you believe. Which raises the obvious question - How many will it take for you to believe it to be true? What is your exact threshold of belief? I am going to guess 42, simply because that is a great number.

Re:You can make this stuff up.

[Anonymous Coward]

This is pretty ingenious. They should get to keep the money.

Re:You can make this stuff up.

[Anonymous Coward]

So 24 different news stories is not enough to make you believe. Which raises the obvious question - How many will it take for you to believe it to be true? What is your exact threshold of belief? I am going to guess 42, simply because that is a great number.

Nope, it's 43.

Re:You can make this stuff up.

[mapkinase]

"42" is no doubt a great answer to everything, obviously including this.

I think dozens is below the threshold, lower hundreds is a grey zone and after that it becomes a well manufactured fact :-)

BTW, somebody posted a reply to one of my comments with the story from 2009 about the same thing (same style of robbery, same bank chain). I suspect now that it is either an old hoax or at least old news.

Re:You can make this stuff up.

[Mister Whirly]

Well, news outlets hardly ever let "facts" stop them from running a great sounding story.

Re:You can make this stuff up.

[CraftyJack]

That idea sucks.

Watch the language...let's keep it clean.

Re:You can make this stuff up.

[Anonymous Coward]

If you ban vacuums, only the criminals will have them!

Re:You can make this stuff up.

[formfeed]

Years ago, the Beagle Boys did a similar thing to empty Scrooge McDuck's vault.

What does that mean?

That people designing security systems should read more (cartoons) and be more creative?
No! It means that cartoons should be censored. People who read this stuff as a kid could end up as criminals later. Most people committing these crimes were probably exposed to Disney during their childhood. It's not ego shooters, it's Disney cartoons.

Re:You can make this stuff up.

[lazyforker]

Nature abhors a vacuum.

Re:You can make this stuff up.

[jpyeck]

I've already seen the bumper sticker for that: "Mean People Suck"

Re:You can make this stuff up.

[Anonymous Coward]

... space is full of vacuum ...

Really? Hmmm.

Re:You can make this stuff up.

[orgelspieler]

Why not? Wire cutters are illegal in Austin.

Re:You can make this stuff up.

[Anonymous Coward]

Only those with a proper amount of suction.

Re:You can make this stuff up.

[rubycodez]

I think my neighbor has a sound-suppressed vacuum. the BATFVC should kick in his door.

Re:You can make this stuff up.

[rubycodez]

and there's really no need for hand vacuums. too easy to conceal.

Re:You can make this stuff up.

[Anonymous Coward]

Better yet, register everything that sucks!

Re:You can make this stuff up.

[Carewolf]

6 results, 24 news articles - same number (I check it probably 6 times already today - one per each comment like yours). Not very impressive and below my personal threshold of belief at Google News.

Yeah, things happing in foreign countries are a hoax. France is probably not even a real country. I mean if this was real, it would be in English.... Right???

Idiot..

Re:You can make this stuff up.

[mapkinase]

"France is probably not even a real country. "

Yeah. That was exactly my point.

"Right???"

Right.

Re:You can make this stuff up.

[meerling]

So that's why they only show Mother Nature with a broom... I did not think of that before.

Re:You can make this stuff up.

[eamonman]

suck you

Re:You can make this stuff up.

[Darinbob]

They would have to ban the vacuum between the ears, but legislatures won't outlaw themselves, so...

Re:You can make this stuff up.

[WWWWolf]

No..

declare only terrorists own vacuums..

Then point out to the moron senators that space is full of vacuum and we should declare war on it.

Suddenly NASA has all the money it needs.

But then the moron senators declare that these newfangled manned NASA crafts are no longer scientific vessels, they're warships, and should be equipped with weapons. In this early phase, NASA may need to drop a few pieces of life support gear to make space for that stuff...

(Not my joke, though)

Re:You can make this stuff up.

[Anonymous Coward]

That's it. We should ban vacuums.

Sucker!

Re:You can make this stuff up.

[Deefburger]

It'll never work, unless the vacuum in the Senate Chambers is exempt from the war on vacuums.

Re:You can make this stuff up.

[Dabido]

I don't remember that exact movie, but I do seem to remember seeing this before in either TV series or a movie somewhere.

Personally, I think they want to stop with the Monoprix and start chasing the Grand prix

What about a one-way valve in the tube system?

[Anonymous Coward]

Right before the safe. Too easy maybe?

Re:What about a one-way valve in the tube system?

[clone53421]

What good is a safe that only lets you put money in? You might as well use the bills to light cigars...

Re:What about a one-way valve in the tube system?

[BarryJacobsen]

What good is a safe that only lets you put money in? You might as well use the bills to light cigars...

One would assume that they use the door of the safe to remove the money and only use the vacuum to deposit the money.

Re:What about a one-way valve in the tube system?

[clone53421]

Yes, and one could assume a number of other false premises as well.

Noise

[Thelasko]

Wouldn't a vacuum cleaner that size be really loud?

Re:Noise

[MBGMorden]

With proper baffling you can quiet down just about anything. Also depends on the area. In many cities there's pretty much constant road-work being done. If they could possibly park it beside the street I'd bet almost everyone would just assume it was construction equipment and wouldn't even question it.

Re:Noise

[Abcd1234]

Plus, you really can't underestimate the ability of people to ignore things that don't immediately concern them.

Re:Noise

[i.r.id10t]

The famous "Somebody else's problem" field

Re:Noise

[clone53421]

Or the ability of people to assume that weird activity is normal because the guy was wearing overalls and a cap and looked like a maintenance worker.

Re:Noise

[the_fat_kid]

loud? do you mean as compared to cracking open the safe?
or as compared to the cleaning crew? or the air conditioner?

I bet no one notices it.
It would be different if it was in your bed room, but in a empty supermarket I don't see it as a problem

Re:Noise

[Anonymous Coward]

That seems very likely and I doubt that the machine needs to be that quiet anyway. I live in a busy suburb of Paris and the vacuum pump would compete for attention of Ambulances, Police cars, Fire trucks (these vehicles almost always use their sirens nomatter if they need to or not (not a joke)), side-walk cleaning trucks using high-pressure water canons, garbage trucks, motor cyclists driving on the sidewalks or dodging traffic in other insane ways, road works, sign works, bus stop works, moving vans, plumbers, electricians and plenty of buses of various shapes. Who would care of another machine or compressor noise in this madness?

All this can be seen on a daily basis on my street where, incidently, there is a Monoprix located.
And before you bring it up - yes I want to move away from this cacaphony badly :(

Re:Noise

[Abcd1234]

Ahh shit, I can't believe I missed the opportunity to break out that reference... *sigh* I am shamed.

Re:Noise

[kevinNCSU]

Yes, but unfortunately dogs can't call the police and since they are the only animal which believes the operation of a vacuum cleaner is a sinister act worth alerting authorities for the thieves plan is pretty foolproof.

Re:Noise

[Sulphur]

Or the ability of people to assume that weird activity is normal because the guy was wearing overalls and a cap and looked like a maintenance worker.

Unfortunately all of them were working. The illusion was spoiled.

--

Life imitates art.

Re:Noise

[Anonymous Coward]

Yep, overall and cap gives you a free card to do pretty much anything.
Put a tent against a wall and knock it down. (Or paint grafitti if you swing that way.)
Steal the traffic lights. Dig a hole _anywhere_. Block the road.
No-one will ever raise an eyebrow no matter what you do as long as you wear the magic overall.

Duckburg

[Sonny Yatsen]

Did anyone else picture the Beagle Boys doing this when you read the article?

Wow.

[Anonymous Coward]

That sucks.

Re:Wow.

[Anonymous Coward]

So long Suckers!

well, that blows

[FuckingNickName]

[prompt]

Re:well, that blows

[hsmith]

no, it just sucks

Re:well, that blows

[FuckingNickName]

What sucks enough must blow.

Similar to Mission Impossible

[KDN]

Sounds like an episode from the old Mission Impossible TV series. They drilled a big hole in the bottom of a safe and then vacuumed all the money out. I've always wondered if this would really work (Sounds like a request to Myth Busters) But now I know.

Re:Similar to Mission Impossible

[mapkinase]

Amazing. I was just going to post a comment "movie is pending".

I wonder what type of vacuum cleaner they used. I would suggest a bagged one with filters removed.

Re:Similar to Mission Impossible

[bsDaemon]

Well, nothing sucks like a VAX...

Re:Similar to Mission Impossible

[KDN]

Can you imagine the commercials if its a Dyson? :-)

Re:Similar to Mission Impossible

[mapkinase]

You can start the countdown, my friend. Besides obvious reenactment of the robberies, I can foresee juxtaposition "Make money at home by vacuuming" and "feel like Bonnie the Housewife".

This is why lo-tech will always prevail

[Anonymous Coward]

n/a

If only they had the glue.

[Anonymous Coward]

http://disneycomics.free.fr/Ducks/Barks/show.php?s=date&loc=1963/W_US_42-02

beautifully done :)

[roman_mir]

good stuff, excellent hack.

Of-course there should have been a one way flap valve probably with an electrical/timer lock there as well.

Security, it's a process, there is no one single thing that is a magic silver bullet that provides it...

Re:beautifully done :)

[netrage_is_bad]

I would hope that someone is working on fixing this bug since they've been doing this for 4 years.

Re:beautifully done :)

[Anonymous Coward]

Depends, how much does it cost to fix compared to leaving the exploit in the wild? Although after four years of active exploitation, the point of diminishing returns might be coming up.

Re:beautifully done :)

[TheLink]

Perhaps it isn't hurting the supermarket enough.

The thieves have taken 4 years to suck up 500000 euros. That's 125000 per year.

Monoprix have more than 300 stores. If it costs more than 500 euros per store per year to install, maintain and support the extra security measures, it'll cost them more than the thieves are taking.

Monoprix might just be hoping that the police would eventually catch the thieves, and nobody else will copy them.

Will be a different thing if they shot or hurt people (since customers might stop going to their stores).

Lastly if the team has 3 members, assuming equal shares, each is only getting an average of about 40K per year. Not peanuts but definitely not a good way to get rich :).

In contrast, those infamous investment bankers and friends have certainly taken more than 40k/year each...

Re:beautifully done :)

[Anonymous Coward]

Maybe the security system is open source? That would explain the lack of bugfix.

Re:beautifully done :)

[jdoverholt]

The previously mentioned one-way flap valve seems like an inexpensive and effective retrofit. I was able to think of it in the several minutes between reading the summary and the comment by A/C earlier, I'm pretty sure I could have a deployable solution in less than four years.

Re:beautifully done :)

[mapkinase]

"
Lastly if the team has 3 members, assuming equal shares, each is only getting an average of about 40K per year. Not peanuts but definitely not a good way to get rich"

For some reason this brought to me a vivid image of a day trading soccer mom from Ramona.

Re:beautifully done :)

[Aladrin]

15 stores in 4 years... That's about 4 jobs per year. 10,000 euros per job. I'm assuming it only takes a few hours, max, to do this, so 10,000 euros in only a few hours.

Yeah, you won't be a millionaire at that pace, but you have a LOT of free time in-between jobs.

Re:beautifully done :)

[Anonymous Coward]

40K Euros is about 55K dollars, depending on exchange rate. And it's tax free, so it's the equivalent with French taxes of earning about 85K Euros. And that's for 4 nights of work. Think of it as a very nice bonus to their regular day jobs.

Re:beautifully done :)

[Anonymous Coward]

True, but that is tax-free, and you have to add on the benefits they receive for having an official income of 0.

I would think an income of well in excess of €100k per year given all taxes and the value of social benefits, housing subsidy etc.

Re:beautifully done :)

[RabidMonkey]

I have worked for a large retail chain, and I can whole-heartedly confirm this logic. They have a chain of over 1000 stores, and some of the costing that was done blew your mind.

Want to put a lock on the IT cabinet in each store? $100 per cabinet (buy the lock, pay the service guy to go in, train the store people to use the key/make duplicates). *1000 stores, and you're suddenly looking at a non-trivial amount of money for something that should be a simple, no brainer.

We saw similar things when we wanted to put a shelf in each cabinet to help organize the various little device that went in the cabinet. $200 per store ... forget it. Print labels to put on each piece of equipment to help the store identify it? $50 per store. Forget it.

It was a good experience ... we learned how to think in massive scale for every project, every little idea we had, but we also found it incredibly stifling. And thats why I *used* to work there.

Re:beautifully done :)

[Atrox Canis]

You may be on to something. And if you factor in the time to contract union labor in France, the limited available work hours due to union demands and the compensation requirements for said limited work hours. The store management may be secretly thanking the thieves for saving them money because of tax write-offs.

Re:beautifully done :)

[nametaken]

I'd always imagined the trick there is to present your case in a, "It's $350 per store, one time, but it'll cost you $1000/yr, per store, in lost/broken equipment and wasted man hours if we don't".

Re:beautifully done :)

[wideBlueSkies]

I don't doubt your experience at all. I can see things going down that way, corporate culture and all being what it is.

But I still don't get it.

If a guy with a small store would have to expense similar tasks, (locks on cabinets, a labeling system, etc).. at his level of the economy. Why is the same a problem for a huge 1000+ store chain? I mean, they are that big because they are making money - right? And you'd think that the economy of scale would mae the installation of some of these things even cheaper proportionally than it would be for the small shop guy.

Re:beautifully done :)

[Anonymous Coward]

The scaling is not linear. As a company gets bigger they do make more money but not as much more as it costs to run things.

That's a problem in general with all sorts of designs that need to scale. Once you get past a certain point you run into all sorts of organizational and operational issues that are difficult to solve.

In other words, it's much harder to maintain a huge successful business than a small successful one. Think of it as a King of the Hill game.

Re:beautifully done :)

[Anonymous Coward]

How do you cost out not having a lock on a cabinet or not having a extra shelf?

Re:beautifully done :)

[catmistake]

There is a rather significant difference between 40,000€ at once and a 40,000€/yr salary. One can get rich quicker with the lump sum than having pay spread across the whole year.

Re:beautifully done :)

[mdielmann]

Maybe you should have also looked at the cost of the things your were trying to prevent in your proposals, too, because they also scale. 5 minutes a day looking for unlabeled things piled at the bottom of a cabinet * 1000 stores * 365 days per year * 2 years is how much? Hmm, about $300k (assuming a $5/hr wage). It looks like your proposal was poorly done.

In a bigger picture, things are rarely done 'just because they should be'. Usually there's a cost involved in not doing it, or profit-making organizations wouldn't be doing them. What's a real grind is working for those companies that refuse to see the cost of not doing it, because they see cash as something not inherently linked to risks or people's time. These are the people with no disaster recovery plan because that's a lot of money and the odds of a disaster affecting them are so small.

Re:beautifully done :)

[eth1]

Because at that scale, it's enough money to notice.

When I worked at a small 10-employee company, the owner would always get really good coffee for the break room. Cost a few $ more, but wasn't a big deal.

When I moved to a 20,000-employee company, the good coffee didn't last long, because $(peanuts * 20,000) is enough savings to be noticed (and increase the bonus of some executive, so he's not going to leave it on the table for the next guy).

Re:beautifully done :)

[jahudabudy]

Risk assessment. The guy with one store only has one store. If someone steals his server, he is tits up till he replaces it. If someone steals one of the servers out of one of the 1000 stores, there are still 999 making money for the company.

Re:beautifully done :)

[IICV]

When I moved to a 20,000-employee company, the good coffee didn't last long, because $(peanuts * 20,000) is enough savings to be noticed (and increase the bonus of some executive, so he's not going to leave it on the table for the next guy).

I kind of doubt that actually works, when you factor in employee productivity lost to bitching about the shitty coffee and Starbucks runs.

Keep in mind that small things like this cut both ways - they cost a lot of money only in the aggregate, but they also provide a lot of benefit in the aggregate.

Re:beautifully done :)

[Bob-taro]

How do you cost out not having a lock on a cabinet or not having a extra shelf?

Actually in the case of the lock that would be easier to cost out for 1000 stores than for 1 - how much did you spend last year fixing problems caused by unauthorized access? If it hasn't been a problem at any of your stores, maybe you don't worry about it.

Companies can be really crazy about this kind of thing, though. A billion dollar company will get all excited about something that measurably saves a few thousand a year without noticing that it incurs an unmeasured cost far exceeding that by inconveniencing their employees and cutting into their productivity.

Re:beautifully done :)

[TermV]

You can't measure productivity loss associated with buying cheaper coffee, nor would the executives go through the effort to try. It's trivial to measure the cost savings of buying the cheap coffee and to discipline anybody who spends too much time at Starbucks.

Re:beautifully done :)

[Anonymous Coward]

The thieves have taken 4 years to suck up 500000 euros. That's 125000 per year.

Lastly if the team has 3 members, assuming equal shares, each is only getting an average of about 40K per year. Not peanuts but definitely not a good way to get rich :).

But it's tax free! ;)

Re:beautifully done :)

[iosq]

Starbucks runs? Wouldn't that just make the shitty coffee problem worse?

Re:beautifully done :)

[Anonymous Coward]

One store gets burgled an average of once every five weeks for four years. The thieves only hit the stores of one company. The investigators know the modus operandi.
Yet nobody bothers to lift a finger to stop it?

How very French!

Although it might seem expensive to install anti-theft devices and train the employees how to use them, wouldn't a really big cork be all that's needed to nip this problem in the bud?

Re:beautifully done :)

[TheLink]

But it's tax free! ;)

I doubt it. Just because you don't declare your income doesn't mean it's tax free...

Re:beautifully done :)

[nametaken]

Sure. If you have data on the subject, you use historical data. If you don't have a problem, you don't have a problem.

As for wasted man hours or other hard-to-gauge issues, you petition for a test roll-out to a few locations and make your case after you get your data. "How long did it take to troubleshoot X issue?" information is collected from locations both with and without your additions. If there's a difference, you have a case. If there isn't a difference then there wasn't a real problem in the first place. The company has learned something and your only exposure was the roll-out cost in the test stores.

Re:beautifully done :)

[minstrelmike]

Consider the cost of governing a nation of 330 million people. Costs expand quickly even tho 'common sense' says it shouldn't.

time ot sue vacuum makers

[Anonymous Coward]

after all like software that does p2p its the cause of them being able to steal cash....we need to regulate and make sure you have controls for the vacuums

Re:time ot sue vacuum makers

[noidentity]

Maybe France needs a three sucks and you're out law. They could have an anonymous way to report infringing uses of your vacuum cleaner.

Re:time ot sue vacuum makers

[Anonymous Coward]

Don't stop there. Ban keyboards too, because they cause spelling errors. Then ban Slashdot for allowing spelling errors when they published your post as their property in Copyright.

Or were you dictating to a the Keyboard.

hold on your horses

[mapkinase]

Look at the google news results for "robbers paris vacuum"

http://www.google.com/search?q=robbers+vacuum+paris&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8&aq=t&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official&client=firefox-a#q=robbers+vacuum+paris&hl=en&client=firefox-a&hs=Kpo&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official&prmd=ivnb&source=lnms&tbs=nws:1&ei=Nq6cTLiHO8T7lwfn77XaCg&sa=X&oi=mode_link&ct=mode&ved=0CAwQ_AU&fp=4e781b66e30e329a

Are you sure this is not faux news?

Re:hold on your horses

[jlf278]

I think it's real news. it's on Sun, The Register, and Metro UK news websites.

Re:hold on your horses

[thijsh]

You are smart enough to use 'faux' to describe this news, but not to google on the French words: 'voleurs paris aspirateur'... For example the first link I found.

Other than that: Nice try, It's good to check for faux news, but be sure not to make a faux pas youself. ;-)

Re:hold on your horses

[JasoninKS]

Perhaps, but real news outlets have picked up and ran with hoax stories before, posting them as real and never knowing the difference.

Re:hold on your horses

[mapkinase]

Sometimes whistleblower just blows :-)

Also, your link (while narrowed down to News only search) comes up with 24 articles (which is still lower than my fact threshold). Hardly "stuff that matters" anyway (well, I guess, hence "Idle" section).

Re:hold on your horses

[Stavr0]

Le gang à l’aspirateur dévalise les Monoprix

I am reminded of Sam Lowry when he overloads the pneumatic system in the Information Retrieval department ...

Re:hold on your horses

[mapkinase]

Looks like it is old news:

http://www.leparisien.fr/faits-divers/un-gang-de-cambrioleurs-devalise-les-monoprix-27-12-2009-757296.php

That is why so few sources in News section

Thanks to one of the commenters in this thread (should be modded up, but I cannot locate it anymore)

Re:hold on your horses

[RKBA]

Look at the search results for cambrioleurs aspirateur monoprix.

Fool me once...

[McGregorMortis]

They've been doing this for four years?

Re:Fool me once...

[Kenoli]

Fool me... 15 times... :(

you would think after the second time

[FudRucker]

the store's district managers would implement a fix, even an inexpensive low tech one like a one-way flapper type valve would put a stop to that

Re:you would think after the second time

[rjstanford]

And if it occasionally (even very occasionally) screws up, which backs up the deposit-money-into-the-safe part of it? At 40K per year, it doesn't take many screw-ups for the solution (including design, testing, installation, annual testing, repairs, etc) to cost more than the problem.

15 branches of the same store in Paris?

[macwhizkid]

Are they living in a vacuum? How many times do you have to get suckered before you change your system? Their business must really be going down the tubes. It blows me away.

(I'm just cleaning up today... :)

Re:15 branches of the same store in Paris?

[arndawg]

They're French. It's in their nature to lose stuff.

Re:15 branches of the same store in Paris?

[cmiller173]

So your saying the store simply surrendered?

Re:15 branches of the same store in Paris?

[Anonymous Coward]

I was going to reply "I'm French, you insensitive clod", but decided to give up.

Why don't they store the cash in nylon bags?

[Anonymous Coward]

If the cash was put in a tough zipper bag this vulnerability would be closed at a cost of about $50.

Very amusing little scheme, but doesn't compare to the US where the bankers took $2T from the government to bail out their Ponzi scheme, and won't say where it went...

Re:Why don't they store the cash in nylon bags?

[Anonymous Coward]

The cash is sent to the Safe the same way it is sucked out - though the pipe. I don't know if the pipe transport is with positive pressure or a vacuum, but in either case I don't see how a nylon bag would prevent sucking it back out.

I'd fix this with spring-loaded Umbrella-like containers for the money - hold down the umbrella/rods/hooks carefully when inserting the money in the pipe, it unfolds automatically when it drops into the safe. Alternatively, use a cheap wind up mechanism that extends after a few minutes, hopefully after it has arrived in the safe.

HADOPI

[srussia]

That's 15 times already that they've connected to the intertubes to illegally download stuff. HADOPI should have sent out 5 cut-off orders already. Oh wait, they are actually stealing real stuff? Carry on then.

Valve

[bjorniac]

Couldn't this be solved by putting a simple valve into the pneumatic tubes just above the safe?

Re:Valve

[Anonymous Coward]

    All it would require would be something like this or this. Basically a check valve. It flaps open when the air flow is going the correct way, and slaps shut when it's going the other way.

    At $100 (parts and labor in USD) across their 300 stores, that would only cost $30,000. That's a lot cheaper than the $673,750 (USD)

Blame the idiots at the wheel

[suman28]

This doesn't sound like a case of smart criminals, but dumb executives at the head of the supermarket. If this has been going on for four years, why hasn't the company done something to fix the weak link in the chain to begin with? Serves them right for ignoring or not addressing the problem in the first place.

This isn't new

[Nuskrad]

Thieves have attempted this approach for as long as this type of cash delivery system has existed, and consequently there are numerous security measures to prevent it. The ceiling space that contains the tubes is usually protected by motion sensors, the cash delivery system usually has some form of intrusion countermeasure that would detect a change in pressure, and the most simple method is a timer system that detects whether the money is received in the strong room N seconds after it's sent by the cashier, triggering an alarm if not.

It seems that for whatever reason this chain of stores hadn't implemented the basic security measures, or they were ineffective, probably due to human error (i.e. forgetting to set the alarm in the roofspace).

Re:This isn't new

[interval1066]

"It seems that for whatever reason this chain of stores hadn't implemented the basic security measures, or they were ineffective, probably due to human error (i.e. forgetting to set the alarm in the roofspace)."

Forgetting to set the alarm on 15 different "Monoprix" (whatever that is) stores? No, there was a fundamental design flaw in the system. They didn't implement a basic security measure, ie; installing a simple, one-way baffle or hatch that would allow the money to enter the strong room but not leave it, at least through the pneumatic tube system, was all that would have been required. Good allegory on security in the digital age; your only as strong as your weakest point. Usually its the system architect. I wonder if Monoprix had had this cash delivery system peer reviewed if it would have still passed into general use.

Re:This isn't new

[DeadboltX]

It seems like adding some sort of unidirectional valve would be an easy fix, unless of course they regularly need to shoot money back toward the registers.

Re:This isn't new

[NetNed]

Hey how about a simple check gate that doesn't allow reversal of air flow in the system. Cost would be cheaper then anything and pretty easy to implement in a number of areas in the system. Something like what keeps the air in a air mattresses when pressure is removed from a unplugged air nozzle.

Re:This isn't new

[Eil]

If they've been doing it this long, I wonder if they're getting inside help. Monoprix doesn't seem very determined to stop them.

Re:This isn't new

[Anonymous Coward]

how about a one-way valve on the safe that closes when the pressure is going the wrong way (i.e. out of the safe...)
it could be designed to draw air from outside the system when closed, so they don't have to worry about strong vacuums damaging the system.

Re:This isn't new

[Private Baldrick]

These vacuum delivery systems for cash are quite often decades old. I remember seeing them in the 70s as a kid (in other stores). We could be talking about a legacy system here. In 1956 they had 199 stores (according to their company history translated by Google).

We're looking at an old system that someone is exploiting a inherent weakness in and creating a solution/fix for it would cost a lot or require the retiring of the system. Similar to the problems with legacy old IT systems.

Read the article?

[dclozier]

You must be new here. ;)

Sounds like

[twoears]

Sounds like my ex.

At least they have a lead...

[Ecuador]

They were caught on CCTV but were all wearing balaclavas and could not be identified, the spokesman said.

So I guess they are concentrating on skiers, motocross riders and ninjas. It will be very tough to apprehend them though if they are ninjas...

On another note, who would design a safe with a hole??? Wouldn't that by definition disqualify it from being called a "safe"??? At least they could make the hole one-way (very simple mechanisms for that)...

Re:At least they have a lead...

[zmollusc]

Many safes have holes. You can then have employees put money in the safe while not having the ability to get the money back out if someone holds the place up.

Well someone's got to say it:

[Chrisq]

Well someone's got to say it:

A gang of thieves armed with a powerful vacuum cleaner that sucks cash from supermarket safes has struck for the fifteenth time in France.

That sucks!

Operation Vacu-Suck!

[Zen-Mind]

I'm really disappointed guys, nobody made any references to Spaceball yet...

Lewinskied Again

[hyades1]

"...the gang - dubbed the Vacuum Burglars - always raid Monoprix supermarkets...

Something that sucks for money and a store called "Monoprix"? The jokes pretty much write themselves.

Like a bad movie

[norpan]

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0091314/

It will suck if they get caught....

[realsilly]

... just a little vaccuum humor. /sorry

Domestic thievery

[hey!]

Sure you can vacuum up the money, but how do you launder it afterward?

overestimate

[Jodka]

they have stolen more than 500,000 euros and caused damage to alarm systems and other property totalling thousands more

Because the alarm systems are clearly worthless the cost of the damage to them must be $0.00 at most.

One-way check valvle?

[Anonymous Coward]

Why not install a check valve at the safe? It should be just a simple trap-door, and very inexpensive or should I say très peu coûteux!

40k per year

[joeflies]

It may not be a lot to the investment banker, but I'm sure that most of the people committing these crimes have the option of becoming an investment banker.

Re:40k per year

[TheLink]

but I'm sure that most of the people committing these crimes have the option of becoming an investment banker.

Yeah but their conscience might bother them even more.

BTW, I wonder where that 9.7 trillion actually went: http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=washingtonstory&sid=aGq2B3XeGKok

9.7 trillion is a lot of money to take from taxpayers. USD30K per person?

They don't want to tell though. Did it go to investment bankers or petty thieves?

That's nothing

[Anonymous Coward]

You should have seen how fast my ex-wife could suck cash out of my wallet. Then again how sure are they that they used a vacuum? My ex-wife might have just moved to France.

Sounds familiar

[iPhr0stByt3]

I had read somewhere before (maybe in one of Mitnik's books? ) that the first EVER ATM hack was something similar. When they set up a security camera to find out where the money went it revealed that a cleaning service just drove up the machine and sucked out the money. Remember, this was back in the day - like the FIRST ATM in UK or USA or something like that.

One word: Check Valve!

[Tsu Dho Nimh]

That's all it would take to turn the line into a 1-way system.

Pretty easy to fix, I would think

[Anonymous Coward]

Um, wouldn't a vent flap at the strong room end fix the problem? Would prevent air from flowing back out, similar to a vent flap found at the end of your clothes dryer. Total cost, maybe 5 bucks.

Simple solution?

[mystik]

keep ink in glass pellets or something in the safe too, so any kind of violent movement marks all the bills?

Bull Poo!

[zmollusc]

I have never seen a safe with a deposit tube that you could attack in this way.You can't even fish for the capsules with wire or string.

Shenanigans!!

Transporters

[wideBlueSkies]

Just wait until someone invents a transporter system. And same becomes inexpensive enough for the average Federation Citizen to have one.

Re:Transporters

[RoboRay]

Nothing to worry about. We won't be using money then!

4 years? Why not fix the problem?

[walterbyrd]

Just a thought. If you have not about this security problem for four years, why not fix the problem?

insert bad pun here

[Stick32]

Looks like they really cleaned the place out.... *rimshot*

Possible Solutions?

[eegad]

How about including in the safes somewhat fragile dye packs that will rupture when exposed to excessive pressure?

How about a GPS chip that gets sucked up into their bag o cash?

I had a brilliant idea above my head...but

[Anonymous Coward]

but then incandescent bulbs were discontinued, and the Positive vacuum of illuminance went with them.

Check Valve FTW

[Anonymous Coward]

Can I have my 500K Euro consulting fee now?

Not a difficult fix

[Anonymous Coward]

Install a one-way valve at the entry point to the safe. Next?

Damn those suckers!

[microbee]

damn!

really?

[amoeba1911]

that sucks for Monoprix.

french storey pounds ?

[DrYak]

speaking of which : as this is a french gang of burglars,hitting only the french "monoprix" chain of stores, everything happenning in France,and being reported in french press and blogs...
Why the hell is the stolen monney given in british pounds ?!? It's not as if the euro (€) was a totally unknown money, that noboy else has ever heard about. Or is this money a huge taboo in the european country which still refuses to switch to the european monney ?