Burn Notice. [S1.E1: Pilot.]
This is legitimately how I’ve broken into a thousand places like just act like you’re meant to be there and if someone actually ends up calling you out on it just be super confused
#I would be an excellent pentester and actually have considered it as a job many a time#when I was a kid (7-14ish) my grandmother was in the hospital a lot and I was a bored kid that no one was really watching#and we spent days and days at the hospital over the course of those years#so I’d wander around and it became a challenge to see where it could get into without gettting caught#and the answer is basically everywhere#like ther is no legit reason for an 11 year old to be in the morgue but I was tall for my age and I would carry a cup of coffee#and look irritated to be there like someone woke me up for this#and no one would question me#people would ask where are you headed and if you just exhaustedly point through a security door 97% of the time they will swipe their card#-and open it for you
I want to add that I don’t make a habit of this now that I am a law abiding adult, but recently I accidentally did this again. Having been used to having my run of hospitals and walking basically anywhere as a child, I was visiting a friend in the hospital just before covid and I was legitimately exhausted and carrying a coffee cup cuz it was like 5:30am or something dumb, and I went to leave and get to the bottom floor and i’m like “this is not the lobby” and I walked around for a bit and people kept holding doors for me so I traveled through many corridors, and nothing looked familiar, and then I realized every single door was a key card swipe and everyone had mag-stripe badges with varying security levels and I realized I had gotton onto a staff elevator with the staff, who had swiped their card to go down into a high-security area of the building, and people had just been letting me through all these security doors.
So then I had to out myself and be like “Um I accidentally broke into you high-security wing, please show me the door, I’m literally just trying to leave this hospital” and I had to get like searched and stuff.
And what was funny was that while I was blissfully walking around assuming I belonged, No one questioned ANYTHING and in fact, were violating protocols left and right to let me through, but the VERY SECOND I realized I was not where I was supposed to be and let that show on my face, like three people in the hall confronted me.
So the take away is, be confident that you belong, look exhausted and like you don’t want to be there, and carry a cup of coffee. It will open pretty much all doors.
@clutchkuza I feel like you need to hear this lol
No joke, Burn Notice is a great show. If you like Leverage, give Burn Notice a try (its available on Hulu and Prime iirc) and frfr, confidence and an excuse are all you need to get around places
This works I accidentally broke into someone’s whole ass home a month or so ago and uhhh it went fine because I’m short white and VERY CONFUSED
One time while I was in Rome, I was busy admiring the ruins and not paying attention to signage, got lost, and ended up in some kind of archaeological dig or restoration. Not knowing it was off-limits (having missed all signage, as previously stated), I started peeking around all the stone stuff, wandering off the path, and most importantly (to this story), poking around in a hole that had been dug into the ground. I was careful not to touch anything, but still, clearly (to anyone who wasn’t as oblivious as me) this was not a place a tourist was meant to be.
I finally attracted the notice of someone who was meant to be part of this restoration project when I came back up from the hole. He quickly came over to ask me, in Italian, what I’m sure were the very normal questions of “Who are you?”, “What are you doing here??”, etc.
Problem: I do not speak Italian.
My brain’s solution: Quick, what language do we speak that’s close?!
And that is how I wandered up out of a hole in a Roman ruin without warning and began speaking ancient Latin to an archaeologist.
This man’s face went through 15 different absolutely floored expressions in ten seconds, like you could physically see him going through the thought process of “Have I encountered a ghost from ancient Rome? No, ghosts aren’t real. But if ghosts not real, how Latin??? Fellow researcher??? Supposed to be here???”
So this is the story of how I was allowed to walk away without issue at all after blatantly trespassing upon the ruins of ancient Rome, because if you speak Latin, where else would you belong?
Both literally and figuratively:
When in Rome, do as the Romans do.
