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Mark Rober
Car Thieves vs the Almost Final GlitterBomb 5.0
Car Thieves vs the Almost Final GlitterBomb 5.0
Mark Rober
·
18:21 · Dec 16, 2022
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(glass
shatters)
-
This
guy
is
stealing
my
package
from
a
car,
Translating…
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0:00
(glass shatters) - This guy is stealing my package from a car,
0:03
and this guy took my package off a porch,
0:05
but what they don't realize is this is the final glitter bomb,
0:08
Glitter Bomb 5.0.
0:10
And for the final year, when you lift the lid,
0:12
the glitter is delivered by drones. (drones whirring) (drones clattering) Five years ago,
0:21
when these two stole a $6 package from my porch,
0:23
little did they know
0:24
that singular act on an otherwise unremarkable lovely spring morning would set in motion
0:29
a series of events
0:30
that would unleash buckets of glitter in the homes of would-be porch pirates nationwide
0:34
and eventually lead to the takedown of a $60 million international crime ring.
0:39
So today, not only will I show you what happens
0:41
when you combine autonomous drones
0:43
and glitter,
0:44
and then what happens
0:44
when you get into a chess match with a bunch of car thieves,
0:47
but I'll end the whole series with an update on what happened to those
0:50
massive scam call centers we infiltrated
0:53
and exposed in India.
0:54
Now, if you're new here,
0:55
the 10-second recap is that after that package was stolen from my house,
0:59
the police wouldn't do anything about it even when presented with the evidence.
1:02
So at that point, I knew that to avenge the theft,
1:05
I was gonna have to use my engineering skills to go full "Home Alone."
1:11
- Ow! - Yes! -
1:11
And seeing how this is the final glitter bomb video,
1:14
I think it's worth a brief recap of how the box design has naturally
1:17
evolved over the years.
1:18
Out of the gate in year one, it was a simple concept,
1:20
where when you took the lid off the bait package, this cup would spin,
1:24
unleashing a pound of the world's finest glitter,
1:26
and then hidden inside to record all the action, we had four phones,
1:30
plus a canister fart spray,
1:31
in an effort to encourage the thief to get rid of the box,
1:34
so we could go and retrieve it.
1:35
And that went pretty well.
1:36
So we spent the entire next year working on version 2.0,
1:39
where we doubled the amount of fart spray and drastically improved the formula,
1:43
which ended up nearly killing Macaulay Culkin.
1:44
(Macaulay coughs) - Oh, I still smell it.
1:49
(Macaulay coughs) God. - We also switched to biodegradable glitter
1:51
and added a meaningless countdown- - Five,
1:54
four. - And some fake police chatter- - Seems the package may be in
1:57
motion as well. just to make things more exciting.
1:59
Then, for year three,
2:00
we doubled the fart spray canisters once again to a total of four
2:03
and added a handle the thief would be tempted to grab,
2:06
which we covered in that super sticky mousetrap goop.
2:09
And for the previous two years,
2:10
the package thieves would often shove the lid back on right away,
2:13
which covered up the cameras.
2:14
So we added these posts near the top of the box
2:17
that would passively pop out,
2:18
which made it impossible to put the lid back on once you'd removed it.
2:22
- 14,
2:23
13. - We also added flashing police lights
2:25
and made a doormat
2:26
that had these conductive charging contacts
2:28
so we could keep the whole box fully charged until the moment it was
2:31
stolen.
2:32
Then for Glitter Bomb 4.0, as soon as you touched the lid,
2:34
it would get shot straight up into the air,
2:37
complements of these two boxing gloves attached to pneumatic pistons.
2:40
We also added an actual car horn (horn beeping) to make things more exciting
2:43
and redesigned the cup
2:44
so that by using the centrifugal force generated from spinning,
2:47
you could passively get three chances to shoot some glitter instead of losing it
2:51
all in one single shot.
2:52
Then for the porch,
2:53
we built a fake planter box
2:54
that would slide over
2:55
and hide the package at night
2:57
so the homeowners wouldn't have to worry about bringing it in.
2:59
And we were guaranteed to get it stolen in the day
3:02
when the light was better.
3:03
And all of that brings us to year five, Glitter Bomb 5.0.
3:08
I knew this was gonna be the last year,
3:09
so I decided to go for broke and attempt the biggest redesign to date.
3:14
And this is a terrible idea, by the way.
3:16
In engineering, if something is working well enough,
3:18
conventional wisdom states you should basically change nothing
3:22
but pretend like you changed a lot.
3:24
So for starters, last year,
3:25
we had four vials of fart spray for a total of 20 milliliters,
3:28
and for this year, because we're not messing around,
3:30
we have a one-liter tank.
3:32
And for those of you keeping track at home,
3:34
that's 50 times more fart spray.
3:35
To pull this off, instead of using a rotating-cam system like before, now,
3:39
we have a peristaltic pump
3:40
that continually forces the fart spray through two nozzles
3:43
and basically never lets up.
3:45
And because I can't exactly explain how much worse something smells over video- -
3:49
Aww! -...this is a sensor
3:50
that measures the number of particulates in the air,
3:52
and the more particulates, the more intense the smell.
3:55
And if we place last year's glitter bomb in the chamber,
3:57
it measures 250 particulates of nastiness per liter,
4:00
whereas this year's tops out at 750,
4:04
which means it's not only gonna last a lot longer,
4:06
but it's gonna be three times more intense.
4:08
Now, to house that massive reservoir of fart spray,
4:10
we had to expand the footprint for the box,
4:12
which means we add room underneath it to house the brains of the system
4:15
on an upgraded custom printed circuit board
4:17
that communicates directly with all four phones.
4:20
And quick shout-out to my friends at T-Mobile, 'cause last year,
4:22
we found they had the best coverage where we were placing the boxes.
4:24
So this year, they hooked us up,
4:26
and let us put them all on their network.
4:27
Then for the glitter delivery mechanism,
4:29
the idea was to hack some of these mini drones
4:31
and rewrite their code to make them autonomous,
4:33
where they could fly themselves without needing to be in communication with the computer.
4:37
So the idea for this year is the thief would bring the bait package
4:40
back to their house,
4:41
then remove the lid, which would lower these two doors,
4:44
allowing the drones to wake up and take off.
4:47
And so instead of a single concentrated area of glitter from a spinning cup
4:50
like before,
4:51
the drones would just meander all around the house,
4:53
leaving millions of tiny shimmering reminders not to take stuff that isn't yours.
4:58
And as part of our code rewrite, if the proximity sensors register someone approaching,
5:01
they'll just casually fly themselves to a different part of the room.
5:04
And all of that perfectly sets up the checkmate,
5:07
because while they're fully distracted dealing with the drones,
5:09
the box starts to drastically change the room's air quality at a rate of
5:14
one liter per minute.
5:15
This design was ambitious
5:17
and arguably at a much higher risk of failure in the field,
5:20
but then we took it one step further by designing a sister box
5:22
that could be used for a car break-in.
5:24
Since I live near San Francisco,
5:26
which is the smash-and-grab capital of the world, two years ago,
5:28
we went right into the lion's den,
5:30
which placed the box in a somewhat alarming predicament. - I could bang it.
5:39
I could bang... (alarm blaring) (color lines beeping) - And while tempting,
5:39
it seemed irresponsible to have a couple drones flying around inside a moving vehicle,
5:43
so this box could be triggered remotely via text message
5:46
and can activate the fart spray without needing to be open.
5:49
And then right before the nozzles kick in,
5:51
this 360 cam pops up to cover all the action.
5:53
And if at any point the camera senses it's being tampered with,
5:56
just like one of those fancy hood ornaments,
5:58
it will retract itself back inside the box.
6:00
So after about 10 months of designing, building, and testing,
6:04
we set them out on a bunch of porches
6:06
and in a bunch of cars,
6:07
and we waited.
6:08
And we didn't have to wait long. (glass smashes) (upbeat music) - Brand new
6:20
in the box,
6:21
bro. - It's your guys's now! - Huh?
6:24
Check it out.
6:25
I guess it's mine now. - Yeah. (laughs) - Guess this (beep) is nice,
6:29
homie! - I forgot I was gonna ask him what happened,
6:32
but they just pulled out a gun? - Yeah,
6:34
they said I pulled out a... (box beeping) (alarm blaring) I don't think we
6:38
can... (machine whirs) - 15,
6:57
14, 13.
7:00
Three, two, one. (alarm blaring) Activation complete.
7:04
Recovery sequence initiated. (police radio chattering) -
7:10
And I really appreciate the hustle from these guys,
7:13
especially because when all is said and done,
7:17
they just decided to make this their neighbor's problem. (color lines beep)
7:21
When we retrieve this next box,
7:23
as you can see, it was completely destroyed, and the phones were gone.
7:26
But thanks to those blazing T-Mobile network speeds,
7:28
we're able to recover the following footage from the cloud. - But our neighbor here...
7:33
Put it down a little.
7:35
Our neighbor here, he has a camera.
7:36
That's what I was gonna give you for Christmas last year. (woman laughs) - Yeah.
7:40
No way. - What?
7:42
The new one, huh? - Yeah,
7:43
it's the new version. - Can we just leave it in the car for
7:45
now? - Yeah,
7:45
we'll leave it in the car for now. - 'Cause we're not trying to-
7:48
- Bring attention to us. - I'm not saying
7:48
that I did anything wrong. -
7:50
So they eventually took this home
7:52
and were apparently pretty upfront with their kids about where they got it from.
7:56
(kid gasps) - It's a VR.
7:58
That's really what it is.
7:59
It has the handles
8:01
and everything. - So they go for like 400 bucks? - Keep it.
8:04
Keep it.
8:04
They can get another one. - Yeah, you can make money,
8:07
or you can give it back. - I kinda wanna open it.
8:12
Do you wanna open it? - Let's open it. (alarm blaring) - Oh my God.
8:24
It smells! - They were (beeps) lying! - Mom!
8:25
Mom, I think it is a bomb. - Mom! - Get it out of there!
8:33
(camera clattering) (color lines beep) - And in addition to porches,
8:34
just like in years past, we placed some boxes by group mailboxes,
8:38
so that way, we can track the number of good Samaritans
8:40
that will call the number on the box from year to year. - It's
8:42
for me? - It's for you. - Yay! - Yah,
8:58
yah. (sighs) (alarm blaring) (machine whirring) - 15, 14, 13,
9:08
12... (color lines beep) (alarm blaring) - Mom!
9:09
I think it's a scam!
9:14
It's a (beep) scam.
9:14
I knew it. - Scary. - It's a (beep) scam!
9:14
(beep) you, YouTubers. (machine whirring) - What do you think this is? - Yeah,
9:34
(beep) this is a YouTuber.
9:34
They do this to scam people. - 15, 14, 13, 12, 11, 10, nine, eight,
9:40
seven, six, five, four, three, two, one.
9:40
Activation complete.
9:40
Recovery sequence initiated. (color lines beep) - Switching gears for a minute,
9:40
for the past two years,
9:40
I've experimented with placing a glitter bomb in a parked car up in San
9:40
Francisco because it's considered the car-breaking capital of the world,
9:40
and things are so bad now,
9:40
it's not even just the parked cars that are getting targeted.
9:40
They average 73 car break-ins per day, and at this point,
9:40
people have resorted to just leaving their doors wide open,
9:40
hoping the thieves can verify for themselves that there's no valuables inside,
9:40
so they won't smash the glass just to check.
9:40
And for the past two years, while we did get the glitter bombs stolen,
9:40
all we could really do was just play an alarm sound
9:40
so they throw them out- - Hell naw! -...'cause they never actually open them
9:40
in the car.
9:40
And after doing some research, it turns out there's a reason for that.
9:40
It's actually a fairly organized system called a fencing operation,
9:40
where the cards will go out in groups, and then immediately afterwards,
9:40
they'll bring it to a middleman who will pay cash in exchange for the
9:40
most valuable things they steal like laptops.
9:40
But the gut punch is
9:40
that important documents like a passport
9:40
or pictures or plane tickets don't really hold value for the thieves,
9:40
so they just get thrown in the trash.
9:40
And now that we knew they didn't plan on opening the box in the
9:40
car,
9:40
we designed the nozzles to poke through the lid,
9:40
so that even if they just threw it in the back seat,
9:40
once the proximity sensor on the bottom registered it was stolen
9:40
and the box texted us,
9:40
we could track them using the embedded GPS,
9:40
and a simple text message back would raise the camera
9:40
and activate the fart spray for two minutes straight.
9:40
So we headed up to the city
9:40
and placed our modified car box nice
9:40
and visible in the car
9:40
and commenced our stakeout.
9:40
And you can see this first black car rolls up,
9:40
and this guy gets out and spots it but doesn't take it.
9:40
And then a little while later, this beige car rolls up,
9:40
and he sees it, too, and the same thing happens.
9:40
Then not too long after that, this white car rolls up, and once again,
9:40
they clearly see the box,
9:40
but they just leave it sitting right there without even breaking a window.
9:40
And after observing all this,
9:40
our best guess was
9:40
that it was the size of the box
9:40
that was spooking them.
9:40
So we removed the heart
9:40
and all the other critical components from the large box
9:40
and placed them into a smaller box.
9:40
And while it occupied a smaller footprint,
9:40
it maintained all the same functionality of the bigger box,
9:40
while still looking like an enticing item to steal.
9:40
So the next day, we put it back out on the street,
9:40
but this time, someone came by and actually smashed the window,
9:40
only we didn't see them leave with the box.
9:40
And our working assumption was
9:40
that he just wasn't able to open the door to take it,
9:40
but when we checked the footage, it told a different story.
9:40
Not only did he once again intentionally not steal a smaller box,
9:40
but the real reason for breaking the small window was to pull the backseat
9:40
down and check the trunk,
9:40
which means if you take nothing else away from this video,
9:40
you should know putting your luggage in the trunk is not a solution to
9:40
keep it from getting stolen.
9:40
The reason they break these little windows
9:40
so often but it seems like nothing is missing is
9:40
because they're pulling down the seat to quickly check what's hidden from view in
9:40
the trunk.
9:40
And at this point, it was pretty disappointing, but we realized they'd adapted.
9:40
Word must have gotten out from stealing our glitter bombs in previous years
9:40
that a juicy-looking box like this sitting out in plain sight is nothing
9:40
but trouble. (alarm blaring)
9:40
And as an engineer,
9:40
I never claim to have all the answers,
9:40
but I know the process to get to all the answers,
9:40
and that's trying and failing and tweaking over and over again.
9:40
So while we did have a couple useless car boxes and a busted window,
9:40
we also knew their MO, which meant we now had a plan,
9:40
and that plan was to shrink the box down even further to fit it
9:40
into a backpack.
9:40
That did mean we had to make some compromises like losing the camera
9:40
and reducing the fart spray reservoir down to this improvised pouch.
9:40
But to make sure that it was still adequate,
9:40
we sprayed it on this chair,
9:40
and not only did it still last for two minutes,
9:40
but we left that chair outside to air out
9:40
and confirmed a few days later it was still in real bad shape.
9:40
So with renewed hopes, we once again hit the street,
9:40
this time with two backpacks in two separate cars parked in two different spots,
9:40
and as fate would have it,
9:40
they both got hit within about five minutes of each other. (glass shatters) (glass
9:40
shatters) Once again,
9:40
you can see they're checking the trunk.
9:40
And there's two interesting things to point out here.
9:40
Number one, if you look at the jacket on this guy
9:40
and compare it to the jacket from the previous break-in,
9:40
you can see it's the same guy, suggesting they probably work the same routes,
9:40
which means they probably recognize regularly parked cars versus a new visiting car.
9:40
So I felt especially honored
9:40
that a trained professional like this fell for our backpack,
9:40
even if it was possibly in a desperate attempt just to find a belt.
9:40
And number two, you can see just how quickly it all happens,
9:40
even breaking the glass.
9:40
The thing with tempered glass is it's really hard to break until it isn't.
9:40
And while this guy looks like Iron Man here,
9:40
just casually pushing his hand through,
9:40
what you don't see on his palm embedded in the glove is a sharp
9:40
ceramic chunk or a spike of hardened steel,
9:40
sort of like this.
9:40
And as you can see here,
9:40
if you have the right tool to concentrate the force on a really small
9:40
point,
9:40
(glass shatters) it safely crumbles to nothing almost instantly.
9:40
But more importantly than all that,
9:40
now we had both boxes registering they'd been stolen,
9:40
while we tracked them both on their embedded GPS,
9:40
watching as they made their way around,
9:40
stopping periodically to hit more cars. - We could go around,
9:40
or you could get in this car right now. - All y'all seeing
9:40
that Nissan? - Go go go.
9:40
Go go go go. - I thought that was gonna be the one, no catch.
9:40
They had two big (beep) suitcases,
9:40
and they let me steal their stuff. -
9:40
And after they each drove around for about 10 minutes,
9:40
we sent a command to commence Operation Air Freshener. (spray whirring) And unfortunately,
9:40
because we had to condense everything down so small sort of last minute,
9:40
the mic was in the same small box as the pump.
9:40
So we don't know exactly what was said,
9:40
but what we do know is that about 90 seconds after the pump started,
9:40
they tossed the whole bag from the car.
9:40
And the best part about this is that outside the backpack,
9:40
the pump and spray are actually really quiet,
9:40
so the only possible way they could have located the source is
9:40
if they sniffed their way to the answer.
9:40
And as our test showed,
9:40
they'll continue sniffing it for weeks. (color lines beeping) And in the second car,
9:40
it was a nearly identical outcome. - This is a weird (beeps) backpack.
9:40
I'm not doing it
9:40
if it's a purse 'cause God put
9:40
that to me. - Only in this case,
9:40
because the pump ran a little quieter at one point,
9:40
we got to hear them close in on the source. - What the (beeps)
9:40
is that? - What is
9:40
that? - I dunno. - What is
9:40
that?
9:40
Look at it.
9:40
I dunno what to do. - And about 20 seconds later,
9:40
their backpack (camera clatters) met the exact same fate
9:40
as the first. (color lines beep) All right,
9:40
so to wrap up, I'll just say that year over year,
9:40
we've seen a decreasing number of package steals
9:40
and a steadily increasing number of Good Samaritans.
9:40
And maybe people are becoming more considerate
9:40
or perhaps everyone just knows what a glitter bomb looks like now,
9:40
but I love the idea that at some point,
9:40
someone's package wasn't stolen
9:40
because a would-be porch pirate remembered these videos
9:40
and had second thoughts.
9:40
One thing that's not conjecture, however,
9:40
is after so many of you actively shared our video where we infiltrated
9:40
and glitter-bombed those three terrible scam call centers in India,
9:40
it got the attention of some international law enforcement agencies,
9:40
and from the press and because of your efforts,
9:40
those three centers that had each been in operation for more than a decade,
9:40
doing upwards of $20 million a year,
9:40
scamming the most vulnerable amongst us of their life savings, all got shut down,
9:40
with their top officials arrested.
9:40
So thanks to all of you for watching and caring, and of course,
9:40
thanks to these two, because without them, none of this would've ever happened.
9:40
Being an engineer is the best,
9:40
because you can make whatever you can dream up.
9:40
But what's the first step?
9:40
How do you get started down that path?
9:40
Well, I'll tell you exactly how.
9:40
It's called the CrunchLabs Build Box,
9:40
and it gets delivered right to your doorstep every month,
9:40
and then we build it together,
9:40
while I teach you all the juicy physics that make it work.
9:40
It's basically like unlocking your own personal Mark Rober video every month where you
9:40
learn a new engineering principle
9:40
that will have you not just building like an engineer,
9:40
but more importantly, thinking like an engineer.
9:40
So you're developing resiliency and problem-solving skills. - Yes! - On top of that,
9:40
the toys themselves are really fun,
9:40
like this super dope art machine where we learn about linkages,
9:40
or in the spirit of the glitter bomb, this trip wire,
9:40
which you can use to prank your family, or I suppose, in some cases,
9:40
yourself.
9:40
So if you wanna embark on this yearlong journey with me,
9:40
while there's still time to get it before Christmas,
9:40
just head on over to crunchlabs.com
9:40
or use the link in the video description,
9:40
where we're giving it away two months free as a holiday special. (logo chimes)
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B1
Science
19:16
My Rock, Paper, Scissors Robot Never Loses (+9 Other Inventions)
Mark Rober
