Tickets to LockCon are still available as of 20th of September. We will close the registration on the 25th of September. Please see ‘LockCon 2024 registration is open!’ for more information. https://blackbag.toool.nl/?p=4627
Hi Everyone, we are hoping you are doing well! With this blog, we like to show you this program we have created for LockCon 2024. It’s a great mix of the competition you expect, and loads of new and exciting content.
Thursday is the first day of the event, we will use this day for catching up as well as building up the conference room. The cadence of the rest of the event is talks in the morning, a competition in the afternoon, and an evening program which includes a variety of activities.
For the competitions, we have Friday evening reserved for the Dutch Open in impressioning, on Saturday the Dutch Open in Lockpicking will be held, and on Friday we will start and Sunday we will conclude all the ongoing smaller competitions: Lever lockpicking, Disc detainer picking, Felix’s Breakout and Pic Tac Toe by FoxPick, and safe manipulation. The rules for each competition are published here: https://blackbag.toool.nl/?p=4652
The schedule will be available in the conference room on large sheets of paper. The Schedule is not set in stone, where you are allowed to fill the gaps, or take the stage with your own last minute talk. Last year, a panel on RFID was assembled on Sunday to fill one of these gaps. Please discuss large changes with the organisation.
Thursday
17:00
Arrival (Hotel check-in is possible from 15:00)
19:00 – 20:30
Dinner (with prior reservation)
20:30 – 22:00
Conference room build up
22:00 – 01:00
Socializing in the hotel bar
Friday
07:30 – 10:00
Breakfast
10:00 – 10:15
LockCon Opening
10:15 – 10:30
Dennis van Zuijlekom – Shoot all the hackers
10:30 – 11:30
Zeefeene – Why Your Unpickable Lock Sucks
12:00 – 12:30
Michael Hübler – 3D printing working keys for TSA008 and (all versions of) TSA006
13:00 – 14:00
Lunch
14:00 – 19:00
Dutch Open Impressioning competition
19:00 – 20:30
Dinner
20:30 – 21:00
Introduction to the evening program & ongoing competitions
21:00
Start of disc detainer & safe manipulation competition by Toool
21:00
Start of lever lockpicking competition by Nigel Tolley
21:00
Start of Pic Tac Toe and Felix’s Escape by FoxPick
We are excited to announce the competitions hosted at this year’s LockCon. There will be the usual lockpicking and impressioning competitions, as well as a return of the disc detainer picking competition. You can also test your safe manipulation skills, join the lever lockpicking competition by Nigel Tolley, and play multiple games by our friends from Foxpicks.
The smaller competitions will be open from Friday evening till Sunday. Each of these competitions reach their conclusion during the finals on Sunday. This can be either a 1:1 with the best pickers, or a first to open wins where the best are competing all at the same time.
Dutch Open Impressioning & Lockpicking
The two main competitions are impressioning and lockpicking, where each takes a whole afternoon. The main rules are found in the pdf below, but for this year’s event we like to share our competition planning as well.
The Impressioning competition will be a standard competition with a qualification round, and two finals of six people each. We want to reduce the luck factor in the competition. E.g. consistent opens are a better demonstration of skill than a single quick open. For this, we have split the qualifier into two. You will now have to open both Abus C83 locks within two 30 minute attempts. The finals are, as per usual, on Abus C83 as well. The locks and blanks are sponsored by Abus!
The lockpicking competition is a standard competition with a qualifier and a bracket of two and three people. The qualifier has six tables of at most ten people per table. This qualifier is five minutes per lock, and in total you will pick ten locks. The best three from each table continue to the bracket. The bracket is played in nine groups of 2, three group of 3, and a final with the last best three lockpickers. Each round of the bracket is 15 minutes per lock.
Also this year, we have a disc detainer competition. We have learned from the competition last year, and have updated the rules accordingly. We have chosen some great locks for you to pick. This year we have included the Discombobulator from Opsasec in both in front and rear tensioning models, but you can also use the Sparrows 2-in-1 disc detainer lockpick.
Nigel Tolley hosts this year’s lever lockpicking competition. Try your hand at lever lock picking! Various lever locks from the UK will be attending LockCon, for your bafflement and amusement. Try picking a selection varying from 2 levers, uncurtained without anti-picks, up to 5 lever curtained with anti-picks, with various tools supplied. Nothing too hard, and everyone should get at least one open.
The winner of each round goes through to the final, there will likely be 5 rounds of 5 locks for 5 minutes. The final setting will be communicated so everyone is on the same page.
Timing will be like the cylinder picking, call out “open” when you’ve opened your lock. The locks will be modified to not open fully, so expect the bolt to remain sticking out a little when unlocked – but don’t worry, it’ll be obvious! Have fun. Please remember, ‘it’s about manipulation, not brute force.’
There aren’t many rules, but if you break a tool, you’re out!
Foxpick’s games
Foxpick will host two lockpicking games during LockCon. In Pic Tac Toe, you will play a head-to-head competition in a game of tic-tac-toe, but to move you’ll have to pick the locks. For the second game, Felix’s Breakout, it’s your goal to free Felix the Fox from jail! Both games are very exciting, and we hope you will enjoy them as well.
Foxpick will provide all the tools you need. This helps to keep it an even playing field for everyone. Further details of the game are explained before each player starts.
Safe manipulation
To celebrate the skill of safe manipulation, we have included it in this year’s competition list. We are working with S&G 6730, for which we ask you to find the combination. The locks spin true, and read very well, so don’t let this opportunity pass!
With this mail, we like to announce registration for LockCon 2024 to be open. The event will be from 17th to 20th of October 2024 at De Werelt in Garderen, The Netherlands. This is the same venue as last year, which was previously known as Westcord Hotel Garderen.
The program
We will welcome the attendees from Thursday afternoon 15:00 with a get-together at the bar. On Friday, Saturday, and Sunday, we will have a program with talks, workshops, and competitions. In the program there will be plenty of room to socialize, and pick locks. LockCon closes on Sunday afternoon, 17:00-ish.
If you are unfamiliar with what we usually do at LockCon, please read https://toool.nl/LockCon and the LockCon 2023 recap https://blackbag.toool.nl/?p=4357. The schedule for this year’s event will be quite similar, where the competitions are usually in the afternoon, and the remaining program are talks, workshops, and socializing.
How to participate
LockCon is an event organized by Toool in the Netherlands for the extended Locksport community. This means, we try to be welcome to everyone with a healthy interest in the lockpicking hobby and the community. The attendees of LockCon are mostly friends, and friends of friends. You are also welcome if we have never met before. While it is easier for you to have a friend vouch for you, but this is not required.
The venue
This event is hosted at a hotel at which we have rented a large conference hall, and enough rooms to host a hundred guests. We are able to use the other hotel facilities, like the bar and restaurant. The hotel has additional facilities like a sauna, but these will have an additional charge and are booked at the reception.
The ticket price for LockCon 2024 is €430 per person, this includes three nights in the hotel with breakfasts, lunch, and dinner in the restaurant. Some options, like a single person room, have an additional charge.
We are happy to announce the date for LockCon 2024. The event will be from 17th to 20th of October 2024 at De Werelt Garderen. This is the same venue as last year, which was then known under the name Westcord Hotel Garderen.
Registration isn’t open yet, but hopefully this announcement will help you plan ahead.
Hopefully we will see you in October, LockCon Team
The Dutch Open 2023 Disc Detainer competition was held in a self-timed format. Throughout LockCon, the participants worked on getting the best times on the five Disc detainer locks: 001 Fort Knox, 002 Parkside, 003 No-name, 004 Abus Plus, 005 Abus Plus with butterfly disks.
We used the Sparrows Disc detainer pick with a 3D printed spacer. One of the Sparrows tools was modified to allow tensioning lock 004, the Abus 37/55.
Nitiflor won the competition by opening all the locks and won a Sparrows Vorax set. ImSchatten360 opened all locks as well, but spend more time in total and won the second price, a Sparrows Tuxedo royale. Matt Smith opened four out of five and won for the third price, a Sparrows Tuxedo set.
The Pentathlon competition is a series of five lock challenges sponsored and hosted by Parmakey. The competitors had to pick a pin tumbler, pick a dimple, impression a key, pick a safe lock, and pick a car lock. Twenty competitors joined the challenge.
Torsten won the competition with 52 points and won a Sparrows Vorax lockpickset, a book on historic keys. Decoder, with 50 points, won the second price and received a Sparrows Tuxedo Royale and a book on safe lock history. Robert won the third price with 42 points and received a Sparrows Tuxedo set, as well as a book on locksmithing history. All three also received a bottle of Nabucco wine.
Edit: 20240312 We were made aware of a mistake in the official competition results, and would like to correct this. After a remark from one of the participants on his missing opens in the official scores, ParmaKEY checked the papers and found there were two filled in papers which were missing in the official scoring. The table below is the updated scoring form, which now includes the scores from Jascha and Nitiflor.
With this new raking, Nitiflor has the well deserved second place. We decided not to change the original certificate and prizes, but to create an additional certificate with prizes for Nitiflor.
We apologize for the inconvenience, and we will celebrate it with him the next time we meet.
The Toool NL competition is a lockpicking competition which is available at meetups for the members. About twenty locks are selected, and the members improve the picking times throughout the year. Opening a lock in the best time gives ten points, 2nd best time nine points etc. The member with the most points at the end of the year wins the competition. https://toool.nl/competitie2023/
Jos, Henri, Jan-Willem and Rob made a quick start in the competition at the first meetup. At the Eindhoven meetup, Walter took the lead, and kept the top score throughout the year. There was more competition for the second and third place, and was held and lost by many. (Week by week: https://toool.nl/competitie2023/tussenstanden.html)
Walter won the competition with 215.5 points (out of 240) and received a Multipick Kronos Electropick. Tom won the second with 178.5 points and received the Multipick Elite Meister 19-parts lockpick set. Jos won the third price with 170 points and received a Sparrows Vorax pickset and a Sparrows pinning mat.
Kudos to the dozen people who have opened at least one lock in the competition!
The Dutch open 2023 lockpicking championship had 51 competitors. Tables of up to nine were created for the first round, in which relative simple locks are picked in at most five minutes per lock. The two picker with the most opens at the table competed in a bracketed round, where each competitor picks two lock for fifteen minutes each. The last three play the finals.
ImSchatten360 won the competition and received a Multipick Essentials 39-piece lockpick set. Manfred won the second price and received a Multipick cutaway lock and a Sparrows pinning mat. Torsten received a Multipick Bogota set for the third place.
The Dutch Open impressioning championship is a competition in making a key for a C83 cylinder in the least amount of time. For the qualifying round, 34 competitors joined, of which, 27 (~80%) opened the qualifier lock within 60 minutes. The quickest twelve continued to the A and B finals, where they attempted six more locks in 15-minutes per round.
Jos won the competition and received the new Multipick ERAS dimple and disc detainer set. Manfred won the second price and received a Sparrows Tuxedo royale lockpickset and a Multipick cutaway lock. Oli received the Sparrows Vorax lockpickset as well as a Sparrows pinning mat as a third price. Alex, Walter, and Jord received the Multipick Elite LockNoob 10-piece duo peak set, Sparrows Tuxedo Royale, and Sparrows Tuxedo, respectively.
RubberBanned won the B-finals and received a Sparrows Vorax lockpick set. Jan-Willem with the second place won a Sparrows Tuxedo royale. Cocolitos with the third place won a Sparrows Darkshift lockpick set. Morris, Clefmentine, and Relocker received the Sparrows Darkshift, and Sparrows Tuxedo set.
From 12 to 15 October 2023, Toool organized LockCon, a Locksport conference with attendees from Europe and the USA. Here is a recap of this year’s event at the beautiful Westcord Hotel Veluwe in Garderen.
On a warm late summer day, we started LockCon. After check-in and setup at the venue, the first of guests already arrived. It was great to meet so many friends again. On Thursday evening, we dined at a restaurant at walking distance from the venue, after which we set up the conference hall for the talks and competitions. We protected the tables with stucco runner, as locks and vices can otherwise easily damage furniture. The rest of the evening was used to meet new people, catch up with friends and discuss lock topics at the hotel bar.
After a first night of not enough sleep, we had breakfast at the venue’s restaurant. The food selection was nice, from the usual bread to fruit salad, yogurt, scrambled egg, and poffertjes! Jos opened the conference by highlighting achievements of the community, including the LPU belt explorer picture archive and Locksport. Jos thanked the sponsors, Abus, Multipick, Sparrows, and Dulimex, as well as the LockCon team, who make LockCon possible.
The first talk was by Walter, who introduced the Evva Elus electromechanical temporary access function lock, and updated the attendees on the Anker 3800 research. It’s incredible what we can do with a bit of dedication and a 3d printer. There was an active debate if Anker 3800 magnets can be overlifted.
In another talk, Zeefeene shared his insights in manufacturing locks in China. From the lesson in using chopsticks to a deep dive in lock diplomacy. The highlight of the talk were the videos of lock manufacturing equipment, which showed keyway broaches to full automatic lock assembly machines. It was eye-opening as these insights are rarely shared.
After lunch and socializing, it was time to set up for the impressioning championship. Thirty-four competitors tried their skill against the Abus C83. It was nice to compete again, and it’s amazing to see how much different it was compared to the competition last year. In both finals, the majority locks opened, with several competitors opening all the locks.
After dinner, with again a good selection of food, we had an evening of disc detainers. Idanhurja gave a talk on his Abloy disc detainer picking adventures. From figuring out Abloy classic from first principles to advanced techniques to defeat other Disc locks from the same brand. The rest of the evening was filled with workshops on the Abloy classic by Idanhurja and the DaMage Fichet F3D (Not a DD) workshop by Nitiflor. We also made a start with the disc detainer competition. I’ve selected five locks, from ‘relatively easy’ to ‘unlikely to be opened’ and Sparrows sponsored the disc detainer picks.
Saturday we started with my talk about electronic safe locks. I’ve shared my insights in how you can attack embedded systems and specifically electronic safes. The target is the Kaba-Mas X0 series locks. Starting from the X07 from ’92 and building to analyzing the electronics of the X09. I’ve shared about hardware reverse engineering, but also high-end techniques like laser fault injection used to extract the memory content of the lock. While still a lot of work has to be done, progress is made.
Lubos Cech shared stories about the early European lock industry. For example, the euro profile cylinder hasn’t been the standard forever. One manufacturer designed and patented the hole through the two lock bodies to fit a mounting screw. While this is regarded as a mistake from a security perspective, the competitors worked around the patent and came up with many innovative solutions. Including clamping the lock from the side in various ways. The stories fit quite well with the lessons learned in manufacturing shared by Zeefeene.
For the lockpicking championship, fifty-one competitors joined. We started in groups of nine and worked towards a bracketed system after the first round. Many people opened locks, and some were unlucky on the table placement. A lot of pin tumblers have been picked from the following selection: Kibb, Nemef, Mastermate, Dom Plura, Destil, Era, Basi, M&C, S^2, Zi-Ikon, and Winkhaus.
In the evening, Matt Smith (Huxleypick) ran his presentation on Physical Vulnerability Research. In which he shared the things he researched over the years and how others can get involved as well. After that, we ran had the price ceremony for the Lockpicking, Impressioning, and Toool NL competition.
We ended the night with a panel on the new book Locksport. Walter, Jos, Matt, and Nigel shared their stories on what it’s like to write a book on the subject. Where the key point is: it’s a lot of work. A nice summer project, which ends up being several years of small improvements until there is something really called a book. This book is a great introduction to the hobby and will make Locksport more popular than ever.
On Sunday morning, a presentation and panel discussion on RFID hacking was organized by Torsten, Christian Holler and mh. It was well worth the time and certainly interesting to see how hotel cards function. Mh shared a list of the current RFID devices, for those willing to get started.
BugBlue shared how the badge works and how you can start working with shop price tag e-paper displays. It’s a great idea, and hopefully we will see more like it for other events. https://openepaperlink.de/
The final event at LockCon was the Pentathlon competition, hosted by the Italians from ParmaKey. Within about an hour, the competitors had to complete five lockpicking challenges. Pin tumbler picking, dimple picking, creating a key with impressioning, lever lock picking, and car lockpicking. For each challenge, a time limit is given and if you didn’t finish the challenge in the limit, you have to wait a couple of minutes before starting the next one. Participants shared that waiting four minutes after failing the impressioning challenge indeed felt punishing. Mostly, because everyone who passed the gate in time got to continue with the next challenges. In the closing ceremony, the prices for the disc detainer competition and Pentathlon competition were handed out. After which we cleaned up and said our goodbyes.
I would like to thank the people who made LockCon possible. Thanks to Sparrows, who sponsored their disc detainer lockpicks for the dd competition and a large box of goodies including various lockpicking sets. Thank you, Multipick, for sponsoring the prices for the competition, including various community lockpicking sets from Christina, Decoder, and LockNoob. As well as a ERAS disc detainer lockpick for Toool to practice with.
For as long as we work with Abus C83 in the Impressioning championships, Abus sponsors the locks and blanks for the competition. The majority of locks and blanks are used up, and the remaining will be used to teach the skill and help people new to the hobby getting started.
Thanks to Dulimex for sponsoring five Pro-Line padlocks with a Tokoz core to challenge the lockpickers with a unique challenge. The group from Italy, with ParmaKey ran the Pentathlon competition for us, and we thank them for all their effort.
Thanks to the LockCon team who made LockCon possible. Without them, it wouldn’t be possible: Jos, Holly, Chantal, Jan-Willem, and Hugo. While organizing this event was a lot of work, it was well worth it. Finally, thanks to all presenters, other organizers, and participants for joining LockCon as you made it a great event again. We hope to see you all again next year!
All the pictures are by Toool NL. Feel free to use the photos of locks under CCBY4.0, and for pictures with people, please ask for permission first.