The Surrey RCMP are investigating 11 “mouse hole” burglaries, where crooks are cutting through drywall in order to gain entry into a business.
The photo to the left is from a similar styled burglary in Yaletown last year. This type of burglary is very common in commercial offices and retail stores.
In the article about the Surrey burglaries in today’s Sun, the advice offered is that business owners “should also ensure premises are well lit with vandal-proof light
fixtures, and install electronic gates, alarms, closed-circuit TV, and
two-way communications.”
As I showed in a recent post titled “Perimeter Security is more than the front and back doors“, the goal is early detection… the most effective alarm devices that will offer detection while a crook is trying to come through the wall is a shock sensor. Shock sensors get installed on the interior walls and will detect any vibration in the wall… such as when someone starts to kick through the other side of the wall.
Unless you have early detection, and immediate response, the other alarm devices, cameras and two-way communicators will offer very limited value. The suggestion to re-enforce walls with wire mesh and/or plywood is good advice. At a minimum, your server/LAN rooms or other high risk areas should be protected inside your office as if they were located outside of your space on their own.
The most important goal is to detect someone while they are still trying to get inside. Don’t rely on motion detection inside your space that will only detect someone after they have successfully broken in.
Of course, very little of your security precautions, systems or policies will matter much unless you have five-minute proofed your most valuable and important items.
My post on the weekend, Anatomy of a well planned burglary, showed another example of this style of burglary from a few years ago.