back to article Apple Store pillaged in 31 seconds

On Tuesday, around 2 o'clock in the morning, a team of well-choreographed gadget-rustlers needed no more than 31 seconds to clear out an Apple Store in Marlton, New Jersey. Taking only one second longer than it does for Justin Long to humiliate John Hodgman in a "Get a Mac" ad, five masked miscreants tossed a brick through the …

COMMENTS

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  1. damonlab
    Gates Horns

    value?

    And nothing of value was lost...

  2. Steve Evans
    Jobs Horns

    Oh...

    I always thought it was their prices that made shopping an "uncrowded, casual experience"

  3. David Webb
    Joke

    Mad Skillz

    Where did they learn to throw a brick like that? it must have taken MONTHS of preparation in learning how to throw a brick through a window to make it break, goodness! And savvy enough to wear a mask indeed? Crooks are getting smart these days!

    Police are currently on the lookout for masked men trying to purchase power supplies.

  4. aL 17
    Joke

    so much for..

    ..that unpenetrable apple security :P

    also, i wonder if the'll jailbreak those iphones :P :P

  5. TJ 3

    Have you tried looking...

    On Ebay? Or craigslist?

    Ps - Who wants to punch the Reported in the face now?

  6. Anonymous Coward
    Paris Hilton

    Security

    How much would a kensington lock have cost to tie the laptops down? £20?

    Do these standard security devices even work on your average non-conformist down with the man macbook?

    Even Paris is smart enough to secure her expensive electronics

  7. Paul Wells
    Thumb Up

    So very tempted to do that my self

    It's not surprising that people have to resort to a smash and grab at an Apple store - given that 90% of the Apple staff seem to hang around the doorway to welcome people or to cheer them when they leave, and when you do find someone you discover they're wearing the wrong colour t-shirt to actually help you.

  8. pammie
    Thumb Up

    Find My Phone

    Surely Apple (or the police) can use the Find My Phone feature and track down the perps!!!

  9. Anonymous Coward
    Linux

    Security Guard?

    Why did the security guard arrive 1:30minutes after they had left. Added to the 31 seconds it took. It took him two minutes to even notice

  10. James O'Brien
    Joke

    So what I want to know is this

    Is there an app for that?

  11. tyszko

    they were actually filming a new ad

    from what i understand its the first in a new more 'street' grab a mac series of adverts

    see it here

    http://bit.ly/grabamac

  12. Anonymous Coward
    Thumb Down

    offer an opportunity..and theives will take it

    okay,

    so laptops werent secured properly with eg kensington locks to slow theft..

    but why were the laptops all out and freely accessible out of hours? jewellers dont leave all their stock out at night - they lock it away. same should be done here...have a trolley, load it up and lock it all away out of hours.

    if you make things easy, then thieves will target you

  13. Aaron Gilliland
    Jobs Horns

    In summary...

    Faithful fanbois forlorn; fast filching frees Feiss-favoured factotums. Felonious febrile fiends five-finger fantastically fashionable fornication facilitators for funds.

  14. tyszko

    almost certainly a new ad

    IMHO

    this is the final film

    http://bit.ly/grabamac

  15. Chris C

    Second time?

    So this individual store was broken into recently using the same method -- breaking the glass with a heavy object? I wonder if they're going to replace the glass with the same stuff again and wait for another break-in. After the first time, you'd think they would have been smart enough to use safety glass or bullet-resistant glass to ensure it didn't happen again.

  16. tuna 1
    Pirate

    The Greater Good

    New Jersey's Draigslist is going to be having smokin hot deals on iStuff right soon and it won't be a scam for a change.

    Criminals or Craig's saviors?

  17. Anonymous Coward
    Happy

    laughing myself silly

    bwahhahaaaa! hahahahaaa! hahaahhaa! wait !! hahahahaa!

    applestores secure nothing. my friend who is unfortunetly or fortunetly an employee at one of the stores in new jersey had been complaining to me constantly about it.

    their idea of closing was close the doors make sure no one is left do the end of the day report scram and go home.

    hell when i was working for blockbuster video and that was 15 years back we had and still do a policy of locking away all gaming consoles as sop at the end of the day.

    hell its just common sense few bucks spent for a lock on a machine is nothing and not too much of a hassle on either store or customer so why they are notdoing it? common sense out the door along with few grand to save a buck! now excuse me i have to laugh evily and share this one with few drinking buddies for more laughs!

  18. Richard Scratcher
    Gates Horns

    Yet another Windows vulnerability

    Windows security cracked again.

  19. Anonymous Coward
    Joke

    MagSafe

    I guess MagSafe Ain'tSafe.

  20. Anonymous Coward
    FAIL

    @AC

    "hell when i was working for blockbuster video and that was 15 years back we had and still do a policy of locking away all gaming consoles as sop at the end of the day."

    oh dear, you still work at blockbusters, don't you.

  21. tom 24

    Two-and-a-half minutes...

    This video would be exciting and entertaining, if it weren't for the news anchors trying so hard to make it sound exciting and entertaining.

  22. northern monkey
    FAIL

    Oh come on..

    ...do people seriously believe that piece of substandard editing is "the next stage in apple's advertising campaign". The last shot is a standard catalog shot of a macbook with some text overlaid onto the screen, and it comes up too jarringly to be true Apple handiwork (god, I sound like a gushing fanboi - I'm not, believe me!)

    I've got to say though the times I've been in apple stores I've been very tempted to do a runner with some kit - I'm certainly never going to pay ridiculously over the odds (that being their natural price) for a mac, so it's the only way. They do make it handy though if you want to ssh into a remote machine - I did an hours work from the soho (NY) store once.

  23. Efros
    Happy

    I always knew

    Tony Soprano had no taste.

  24. Richard Hebert
    FAIL

    Time to get busted ?

    As soon as those machines show up on the net they will be

    able to track them.Hope they arent clever enough to immediately

    wipe the hard drives and most of all , stay off the net.

    These guys move fast though .. think ill call them when i need

    a team of movers , anyone's got their telephone number ? ; )

  25. Graham Marsden
    Coffee/keyboard

    @Richard Scratcher

    Damn you...!! ;-)

  26. Player_16

    Sealed Batteries.

    At a Apple (or Circuit City) store: 'Hi. May I help you?'

    Customer: 'I'd like to purchase three Apple transformers please.'

    'Boy, umm, why so many?'

    'Uh... The dog tends to go thru them a lot. Yeah!'

    OR...

    'Sorry, fresh out. Can I have your name, address, and # to let you know when we get 'more' in?'

    'Sure. My name...'

    I wonder if Apple free delivers transformers.

  27. J 3
    Paris Hilton

    Well...

    If all things Mac weren't all about shininess and stuff, they could install roll-down metal gates that would be "invisible" during the working hours, but very tough to defeat at other times. But I guess they couldn't stand their store looking ugly at night...

  28. Phil 54
    Thumb Up

    Hilfiger

    Apple is clearly using the Tommy Hilfiger school of marketing: make it easy to steal so that the inner-city steals and uses it, which makes it cool, which makes the suburbs pay more to have it.

    It turned a mediocre polo-like clothing company into must-have hiphop gear!

  29. Sarah Baucom

    Re: laughing myself silly

    Do you really think Apple, the same company that spends $60,000 for a Corian Genius Bar (in the small stores) doesn't lock them down to save a few bucks? The reason they aren't locked down is to not restrict customers who are looking at them. Apple's rules for display (at least in 2003/2004) said specifically not to lock them down. They did eventually start using alarms - not sure if they still do that or not though. They don't put them away at night, and leave them in plain view through the glass doors/windows so people can droll over them even when the store is closed. Yes, it makes them more susceptible to theft, but it also gets more sales (CompUSA lost many a Laptop sale due to having their laptops completely locked down). Looking at the success of the Apple Store, I think they're doing things right.

  30. Benny
    Thumb Down

    Useful

    "How much would a kensington lock have cost to tie the laptops down? £20?"

    Followed by the 30p toilet roll and 20 seconds to open it....gotta love that security....

  31. Ascylto
    Jobs Halo

    Honestly ...

    the things people will get up to to avoid Microsoft problems.

    These poor lads risked life, limb and freedom to be free of the yoke of Ballmer and, as has already been said, used a Windows vulnerability to commit their crime (so, nothing unusual there, then!).

  32. Roni Leben
    Jobs Horns

    Cheap publicity!

    23 laptops + 14 handhelds?

    All used., display units. Real cost to Apple maybe $20k altogether? Properly insured, of course.

    I'd say this is very cheap publicity for Apple...

  33. Matthew 4
    Gates Halo

    wow what pros

    such skill... If only I knew how to throw a stone at a massive sheet of glass.

    What would have been funny is if they used that same glass as they used in that "meet the parents" movie, where it bounced back and hit them or something.

  34. Doug Glass
    Go

    Isn't This Just...

    ... "hardware sharing"? Looks to be the same as "file sharing" where what's legally yours is now illegally a lot of people's.

    Oh well, just the next step in the "sharing mentality" maybe.

  35. Andy ORourke
    Joke

    windows

    Were these made of the same stuff they use for the iPhone screens?

  36. Matthew Ellison

    uncrowded, casual experience??

    I have stopped going in to Apple stores due to the fact the staff can't be arsed and every single machine has got some freetard using it as their own personal web access point.

  37. Anonymous Coward
    Joke

    Typical mac...

    Utter lack of security thanks to the 'we don't get no malware round these parts' arrogant mentality.

    There is a security guard, but just like the java fixes he turns up late. And just like the java fixes he probably wouldn't be able to protect all the vulnerable products.

    Security through obscurity for your apple stores can only work for so long...

  38. Winkypop Silver badge
    Thumb Up

    Windows shopping extreme!!

    All the mac-fan-bois are doing it!

  39. Anonymous Coward
    Happy

    You can't buy good press like that!

    What's that cost, a few tens of thousands max? Now how much free publicity has that got Apple?

  40. Shakje

    @Player16

    At a Apple (or Circuit City) store: 'Hi. May I help you?'

    Customer: 'I'd like to purchase three Apple transformers please.'

    'Boy, umm, why so many?'

    'Uh...Bumblebee doesn't like oranges.'

  41. Les Matthew
    Boffin

    It warms the cockles of my heart

    to see how many commentards can't tell the difference between a door and a window.

  42. Lozzyho
    Coat

    Very sad

    The recession really is making people desperate, isn't it?

    I wouldn't take one even if the smug, smarmy, patronising happy-clapping bastards were handing them out on the street for free.

    Mine's the one with the stolen iPhone in the pocket. Just about to give it back.

  43. Damien Thorn

    Deaf and blind security guard.

    Was that guard pulling his trousers up in the video?

    First they throw a brick or something through the window - clue one for sherlock the security guard (breaking glass).

    Then they run in, I cant believe they could just unplug the laptops without setting off display cord alarms, more noise...by then the guard should have been pointing his gun at them, but nope, 31 seconds after sudden noise he appears as they left, and I think he watched them pooped himself and then came out as they left to see the loss.

  44. Gilbo
    Joke

    Blimey

    They cleaned that place out quick time.

    (coat)

  45. Paul Bruneau

    the guard

    Commentors, if you listened, you would have heard that the thieves made motion to the guard that they had a gun, so obviously he went in back and came out when they left. Perfectly reasonable.

    It does however beg the question, "What is the guard for?"

    As for tying them down, I know that's how you best buy fans expect everything to be, but we Apple customers don't like that.

    Tip to future thieves: close the lid THEN lift the laptop onto your stack.

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