ROBBERS INNOVATE, BURGLARIES INCREASE AND GROWS PRESSURE FOR BETTER PROTECTION SYSTEMS

Innovation

On 19 April, a police operation discovered a gang of burglars specialized in theft and robberies of homes in Rio’s South Zone. According to investigations carried out by the 14^th Police District, the thieves came from São Paulo and invaded homes in Ipanema, Copacabana and Leblon. They were after local and foreign currency (dollars, euros etc.), jewelry, designer handbags and luxury watches. The values subtracted from their victims were quite elevated. Nonetheless, the fact that really drew attention to this group’s actions were their refined techniques and innovative methods of gathering information about their potential victims.

The gang did not use aggressive methods, instead, it was focused on intel work to select the targets and to find ways to reach them. Among the preferred tactics, there was the use of clandestine lists with names of people that had acquired luxury items. An alternative method focused on social networks, where users often exhibit their routines and show off expensive goods and lifestyles without any type of “filter”.

The popularization of social media gives criminals an excellent source from which to conduct research without too much difficulty and without exposing themselves. A popular incident happened in May 2022, with influencer Carlinhos Maia, who had R$ 2.5 million worth of jewels and a luxury watch stolen from his apartment. After two months of extensive investigative work by the police, the perpetrators were arrested. They confessed to having used the influencer’s profile on social media to collect information. The thieves discovered that Carlinho’s home was empty because he posted that he was at a hospital for a plastic surgery and his husband was travelling in Mexico.

Another innovation put into practice by robbers is the use of drones to help with burglaries. For instance, in October of 2022, São Paulo authorities discovered a gang that had systematically employed these devices to gather information about the security system of the properties targeted in the affluent neighborhood of Morumbi; to obtain street surveillance data; and monitor the routine of their victims.

In one of the attacked homes, thanks to the flying gadget, the robbers discovered their residents’ occupation. The tool increases the robbers’ chances of success and of discovering all valuable assets inside the facility they attack.

During a second incident, the same group made use of another new technology in their favor. The victims were forced to transfer R$ 44,000.00 to the criminals’ accounts using the PIX. This technology made it easier and quicker to transfer large amounts of money but, at the same time, gave criminals a tool, which is now frequently used in cases of extortion, mainly in express kidnappings. However, the example shows that the situations in which the Pix can be exploited by perpetrators are still to be exhausted. In addition, it indicates that a burglary can be even more damaging when the residents are at home. In addition to the risk of trauma and physical violence, there is the opportunity to access bank accounts.

The cases above show that, despite the extensive security apparatus installed in homes and condominiums, criminals keep innovating and finding new, less risky, and more efficient ways to invade facilities of all sorts.

Architecture of Fear

The high levels of violence present in the Brazilian cities have profoundly influenced the country’s urban architecture. Burglaries of workspaces and homes played their part in the expansion of condominiums, walled facilities, and the proliferation of all sorts of security mechanisms that have become part of the city’s landscapes, like barbed wire, intrusion detection devices and cameras.

Fear is one of the main drivers behind this transformation in the structure of homes in urban centers. According to the Continuous National Household Sample Survey (Pnad) “Victimization: Feeling of Security 2021” from the Brazilian Institute of Geography and Statistics (IBGE), one of the biggest fears of Brazilians is being robbed.

The survey completed by the IBGE investigated the fear of 13 types of violence by genre, ethnicity, and location of residence. Among those living in the urban environments, 30.8% declared to fear having his/her residence burglarized. The percentage represents the fourth biggest fear, behind: having “your car, motorcycle or bicycle stolen with violence”, with 39.4%; “being mugged on public transport”, with 40.6%; and “being assaulted or robbed violently on the street”, with 42.7%.

Society’s response to burglaries through the implementation of alarms, monitoring systems, guards, creation of condominiums and other measures have improved the scenario but also stimulated robbers and thieves to adapt. In an interview to the magazine Electronic Security (Segurança Eletrônica), Alexandre Judkiewicz, CONIB Country Security Manager, explains that this growth in quality of the security features raised the bar for the criminals and made actions “increasingly expensive”. Therefore, now, “this type of crime is less ostensive, but more creative”, burglars look for innovation and tend to “study the property, behavior profile of residents and, mainly, of employees”.

Not rarely, robbers’ effort to innovate and overcome the protection systems pays off, as it was possible to verify in the events reported in the first part of this text. When the impact is significant enough, it can be seen through criminal statistics. For instance, the most recent data published in 2022 by the Brazilian Public Security Forum (FBSP) on the Brazilian Public Security Yearbook, revealed that, in 2021, home robberies increased by 4.7% in Brazil. The number of crimes went from 32.158 to 33.911, reaching a rate of 15.9 per 100,000 inhabitants.

São Paulo – Professionalism and High Profits

Being the most urbanized state in Brazil, it does not come as a surprise the fact that São Paulo (SP) had alone 14.24% of the home robberies registered in Brazil in 2021. Moreover, it had by far the highest total of incidents recorded, 4,832 – the second place, Pará, had 3,138 –, a number that represents a 4% increase when compared to the previous year.

Even though numbers of home thefts are not readily available on the SSP-SP database, information from previous years confirm that, when thefts – crime without violence or threat – are taken into account, the total numbers are much higher. For instance, from 2014 to 2018, the numbers of home thefts and robberies added together accumulated an average of 12,600 cases per year. In the capital, the average was 6,904.

The most updated numbers disclosed by G1 news portal reveal that the 2023 scenario changed things significantly. In the first quarter, 15,434 thefts and robberies were recorded in the state, a 410% increase when compared to the same period of last year. In the capital, there were 2,199 incidents, a 48% increase. These results represent 171.33 cases per day in the state and 24.43 in the capital.

In the country’s largest, most populous, and richest city, specialized gangs are known for operating constantly on affluent neighborhoods. In the south zone, these groups often target Vila Mariana, Moema, Morumbi, Campo Grande and, in the West Zone, the usual areas of operation are Perdizes, Pacaembu, Higienópolis, Jardim Europa, Jardim Paulista, and Pinheiros.

The gangs’ professionalism and efforts can be explained by the high returns a home robbery or theft may provide. During an interview with the portal Terra, Vinícius Nogueira, 4^th civil police department assistant chief, informed that in some cases, criminals can steal R$ 4 million, or R$ 2 million in jewels and luxury items. Some areas are so profitable that they achieve an average between R$ 200,000 and R$ 300,000. In one of the most profitable cases reported, robbers took approximately R$ 20 million from a single home in Jardins, in April 2022.

Rio de Janeiro – External Influence and Recent Surge

The gangs from São Paulo do not limit operations to their home state and have also been caught in Rio de Janeiro, the second richest city in the country. But they are not alone, sharing space with local groups, the burglars concentrate their activities in the city South Zone, where some of some of the wealthiest people live, like Leblon, Copacabana and Ipanema.

The FBSP report reveals that in 2021 the State of Rio de Janeiro had 1,010 incidents. Though, this figure represented a 39% increase. Furthermore, data from Rio de Janeiro Public Security Institute (ISP) shows that, in the state, most home robberies take place in the capital. From 2016 to April 2023, 36% of these incidents were reported in this area. On top of that, during the first quarter of 2023, the city has been afflicted by a 44.6% increase in cases of robberies. In the metropolitan area, there was a 30% increase. This exact variation was also seen in Rio’s South Zone.

In the city of Rio de Janeiro, home invasions occur with more frequency from 19:00 to 00:00, particularly on workdays. From 7:00 to 18:00, cases are few and sparce. On the weekend these crimes seem to start at an even later period, from 21:00 to 2:00. This behavior, which is described by data made available by the ISP, is corroborated by information provided by Rio’s Civil Police, according to which criminals prefer to carry out stealthy actions by night.

Vulnerabilities

To succeed in their furtive endeavor, the bandits monitor the places to find gaps in security. Lack of training of employees, lack of background check before hiring, lack of procedures or not complying with them, and lack of maintenance of equipment are some vulnerabilities that can be exploited.

Many condominiums invest in equipment, sometimes beyond the necessary, but neither develop standardized written procedures, nor properly train employees. Under these circumstances, it is easy for a disguised criminal to convince an insecure gatekeeper, who fear being reprimanded, to allow his entry by saying that he is a relative of a resident. Sometimes, only by saying the dwellers’ name and apartment number is enough to create pressure.

In other occasions, the installed security gadgets do not receive the necessary maintenance and when an invasion happens, an alarm might be offline, or a camera have its lenses obstructed. The facility must hire a maintenance plan, which is often more important than having the last generation technology.

Being multi-tenant buildings, business and residential condominiums can suffer with a broader issue, the conciliation of perspectives on what security measures should be accepted by all. The gangs take advantage of the lack of convergence of the community members, who may divide themselves between making more rigorous access control and leaving the processes looser, to avoid discord between the tenants.

Common and New Strategies

Already used to the most common weak points in houses, condos and apartments, many times burglars just have to replicate strategies or develop new ones thinking on the same aspects.

Besides drones and the use of social networks, which were mentioned in the first part of this article, new tricks include the use of apps – Airbnb, Vrbo, HomeToGo – to easily rent a house or apartment inside a condominium. This gives them legal access to the facility. Once inside, they can either investigate an ideal target and the local security, and leave to act at another moment, or even complete their objective right away.

The criminals like to take advantage of some profiles that are not seen as suspicious by unprepared security teams, like people of old age, or young women. Criminals undercover act naturally, wear clothes that may suggest that they are accomplishing a daily activity near their home, such as going to the gym – arrive in sports wear holding a squeeze etc.

Impersonating professionals is a technique also used. Thieves obtain the official uniforms or order the production of replicas. They regularly impersonate police officers that carry out Investigative activities – the civil polices and the Federal Police –, and technicians that work for an energy distribution company, a cable TV, an internet provider etc. Sometimes they can go as far as disguising a car to appear like one from a police unit or a utility services company.

One of the most dangerous tactics is the recruitment of an insider, like an employee. This malicious element can look for valuable items and sabotage security systems from inside. Informants can in fact be people with a history of crimes or be connected to someone that is a criminal. This was the case of a caretaker that helped robbers invade a mansion in Jardins neighborhood, São Paulo, where they took R$ 20 million in jewels.

Offices in the Crosshairs

Offices offer great opportunities for burglars, who can go after money, electronics, and even classified data to be sold to the competition. On 24 August 2022, an invasion in a high-standard offices building in Itaim Bibi, São Paulo (SP), demonstrated how far robbers can go when the potential profits are great.

To access the building, a woman, member of the gang, used fake documents and rented two rooms on the 22^nd floor. After monitoring the building’s routine for 22 days, an armed group invaded the offices of one of the companies headquartered there and held the employees hostage for 4 hours. In addition to stealing notebooks and cell phones, the criminals forced workers to transfer R$ 10.7 million from the company’s accounts. The Civil Police emphasized that the loss was not greater only because the bank’s anti-fraud system blocked the operations.

To carry out this attack, the criminals invested many resources and knowledge. The investigators discovered that the office building required a deposit of R$ 22,500 to approve the rental.

The São Paulo Public Ministry (MP-SP) noted that the gang demonstrated high-level sophistication and had privileged information on the company’s bank accounts.

In another case, at least five people invaded a lawyer firm in Jardim América, an affluent neighborhood in São Paulo city, and took R$ 100,000 in electronics. Despite the complete security apparatus present, the criminals broke into the office. The alarm did not work, and they had easy access to the camera’s data storage system, which was also taken. However, one of the HDs with some videos was not noticed and one member ended up being identified.

Vulnerability Assessment

Public authorities, property owners and condominium managers have been fighting burglaries through all forms available, but this is an arduous task. When the action is carried out in a stealthy manner, and without violence or threat, the risk is lower, and criminals have bigger chances to escape. If even after that, they are arrested, sentences end up not being so long, about two years, according to police sources.

In the end, thieves are back on the streets with more experience and, sometimes, with the support of a large criminal organization, like the First Capital Command (PCC). Being part of a gang gives more resources to burglars: connections, personnel, tools, weapons, and money, for example, to pay for a rent in a building that is being targeted.

Since criminals become specialized and adapt themselves to the advancements of the security measures, professionals in charge of holding them back must continue to improve the protection means. At the same time, this must be done with efficiency and effectiveness, respecting the logic between cost and benefit, so that the efforts made correspond to the value of the assets protected.

At MOVISAFE, a personalized method of vulnerability assessment is implemented to identify breaches or weaknesses of a facility. The process is flexible and adaptable to different types of locations: apartments, houses, condominiums, industrial structures, buildings, offices, warehouses and more.

The term “analysis of vulnerability” has also been used to describe this process, in which the state of the physical protection system (PPS) in an installation is evaluated to determine how well it meets the defined objectives. This is done by an inspector that assess the existing PPS of the unit, which are divided into: technological means of protection, physical means of protection, human means of protection, and security policies and procedures.

The greatest danger for facilities is inside them, their vulnerabilities. When criminals study their targets, they look for the breaches to exploit, which are normally found in the unpreparedness of professionals, errors in the use of equipment or facilitation of the action of bandits by residents of employees. According to a survey by Rio de Janeiro Housing Union (Secovi-RJ), 30% of robberies and thefts involve insiders.

MOVISAFE`s method is comprehensive and considers vulnerabilities like the reliability of employees. For instance, the existence of a background check, of an initial and refresher course, and of written procedures for consultation are among the elements evaluated.

It is important to note that a vulnerability analysis should be performed once to establish baseline security measures against defined threats; and should be repeated to verify the effectiveness of the proposed updates and then conducted again periodically to verify that the system is functioning as needed.