Euro Cylinder Snapping burglaries are hot topic

There has been a lot of media coverage lately about how easy it is to snap european profile lock cylinders.  It seems that everybody is talking about it.  They were featured on BBC Yorkshire and Lincolnshire’s Inside Out programme, and then on Radio 4 in February, and this Wednesday, on 7 March 2012, the issue is to be discussed on The One Show.
STOP PRESS: The euro cylinder snapping burglary coverage planned for The One Show didn’t happen on 7 March as expected but we understand that it will air eventually sometime over the next week or two.

It is a fact that most uPVC conservatories doors have these vulnerable euro profile lock cylinders fitted as standard.  They are also used on other uPVC, composite, aluminium and even on some wooden doors.

Thieves can break these lock cylinders within seconds.  They use two methods.  Firstly, the lock cylinder can be “snapped” (broken without any special tools using a technique that exploits an inherent weak spot in most euro profile cylinders), or, secondly, they can be “bumped” (opened with an easily made “bump key”).

Yorkshire Police say snapping was the cause of 27% of all burglaries in Yorkshire last December.  And many insurance companies do not pay out on claims where a thief has used a bump key because, unlike snapping, there is no proof of a break-in.

Master Locksmith and CIA’s Retail Director, Mike Barry, says, “We at CIA have been warning the world how vulnerable these lock cylinders are since 2006.

“As anyone can easily replace these cylinders themselves in 5 or 10 minutes, surely it is worth doing to protect your home and possessions.

“On our website, you will find a measuring and fitting guide document, a how-to video guide, to help you measure for a replacement and another to explain how to fit a replacement cylinder.  It really is very easy to do.” (videos in the margin)

CIA sell three types of secure euro profile cylinder replacement online:

1. The Mul-T-lock Garrison Break Secure range of cylinders still snap if they are attacked but does so at a predetermined position so that it is almost impossible to remove the broken cylinder, which means that the door remains secure.
2. The Gege Kaba LAM pExtra works slightly differently in that the inherent weak spot of the cylinder is re-enforced with a strengthening hardened steel bar leaving the the cylinder almost impossible to snap.NB: There is a less secure pExtra cylinder; only the LAM pExtra cylinders are re-enforced with a steel bar.
3. And the third, is the Yale AS (anti-snap) cylinder – only recently introduced – which combines both of these technologies with added hardened grip deflectors.  This cylinder has become the new standard as is meets the Master Locksmith Association’s own Sold Secure Diamond Standard SS312.

For maximum security, these cylinders can be fitted in conjunction with a replacement multi-point locking system – of which we sell two different solutions online (buy here) that can be tailored to fit almost any door size.