LOL “WTF”CU!

So this morning I see a headline about a technique being used in South Africa to “thwart exploding cash machine raids”. The jist of it:

Cash machines offer an ever-growing menu of services beyond merely dispensing money. For tampering criminals, this now includes a squirt of pepper spray in the face .

The extreme measure is the latest in South Africa’s escalating war against armed robbers who target banks and cash delivery vans. The number of cash machines blown up with explosives has risen from 54 in 2006 to 387 in 2007 and nearly 500 last year.

The technology uses cameras to detect people tampering with the card slots. Another machine then ejects pepper spray to stun the culprit while police response teams race to the scene.

The article suggests that so far, this innovation has accidentally sprayed three technicians in the face, and that’s about it. Which makes sense, because just off the top of my head I can think of a bunch of ways to thwart it – protective clothing, attaching an explosive to the outside of the unit (how are ‘tampering with the card slot’ and explosions connected, anyway?), poking it with a really long stick, etc. And failing that, it’s just pepper spray, which the YouTube generation sprays in their own faces for fun:

That said, with numerous banks in the States shutting down every weekend (this weekend, current tally stands at four), at some point, this may have a negative affect on bank confidence in the US and instigate a run on some little bank with rumors swirling around that it’s going to go down as well. And if it’s a weekend and branches are closed, it’s the ATMs that people will try to hit up.  And if that thrift can’t get a bank holiday declared to withhold the cash — maybe they can at least boobytrap their ATMs to customers in the face with a little pepper spray as a deterrent? Disclaimer: Kidding, and I don’t expect a bank run over here, not really, ever.  It’s just that this technique of boobytrapping the slots sounds more effective at preventing withdrawals than real vandalism/theft.