Address the threat.

Who is my adversary?

This could be "come at" from at least two perspectives. In chatting with some of my friends the suggestion to examine the home for intrusion points came up almost immediately. I agree that this is a reasonable starting point however I chose a slightly different approach; As an engineer I've often been accused by other engineers of "creating a solution in search of a problem". Never mind the specifics of why this occurs with me (though as a wanna-be psychologist this is a fascinating one), I'll accept the criticism in stride and use it constructively (hopefully) in pursuing this step. Profiles of an intruder - First, know your adversary. While this treatment can't hope to represent all possible profiles and motives behind the scourge of intrusion, identifying and addressing the motives and levers of the criminal personae most likely to be encountered at the very least reduces the likelihood of an unfortunate event, and hopefully turns the odds further in your favor. A great place to start therefore would be police records--specifically, what kind of crime has been reported in your neighborhood, or city. I started with a search for crime statistics in my city. I'm going into this with information based on conversations, news stories, and admittedly biases known and unknown that are the result of popular culture and urban mythology. It's my specific hope that as I further study and research that I'll be able to quantify what for me is currently a qualitative analysis, and only so in that it's not backed with hard numbers... the implication of "quality" possibly being a misnomer. Here are the "keystone robbers" that then are my hypothetical starting point.

1. Drug addict - motivation, primarily monetary
2. Voyeur - motivation, sexual thrills
3. Other - this is a big unknown, but there are likely some serious nasties in this category. My intent is to flesh this category out further with data as I find sources and the inclination to pursue this further. However, given that I'm an average Joe, it's unlikely that I've obtained the attention of the decidedly more hardened criminal mind. In a nutshell, I'm just not a juicy enough target for those folks, I have nothing they want, and I haven't done anything to warrant their special attention (or so I hope). So, given that the general neighborhood setting is more likely to produce the former profiles, that's where I'll start.

Here's a list of additional resources:

• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Burglary

What facilitates my adversary's, ...er adversarial behavior

My behaviors

The idea that all good and bad starts with desire provides and interesting framework for analysis. The adage "out of sight out of mind" is profound in it's simplicity. Restated, if someone doesn't know you have a thing, they won't covet it. Combine that with another popular adage, "perception is reality" and you find another opportunity to layer your defenses without lifting a finger. The lessons: 1. Do not permit a potential adversary from gaining first hand confirmation from their own senses that you have a thing they want. 2. Do not permit a potential adversary from gaining second hand confirmation through the stories and gossip of others (that you didn't identify as potential adversaries) that you have a thing that they want. Let's over simplify to illustrate further. If you just bought a sweet flat screen HDTV and drove it home in your equally sweet BMW for all to see, you may be a moron. I'm not proposing going to the other extreme either though. If I bought an HDTV using a fake name and address, paid cash using non-sequential bills, and drove it home in a rusted truck obscured instead a brown box with manure written on the side and just for kicks, coughing, weezing, and oozing puss for others to recoil at as I drive through the neighborhood, I should probably see a therapist. Instead, seek the happy middle ground. Not too flashy, not too pathetic. The idea is just not to draw uncharacteristic attention. The idea is not to create in the mind of a would-be observer, desire.

My barriers to entry

Security is like an onion, it's layer built upon layer. If we accept that even the most effective efforts to avoid planting desire in the heart of a would-be adversary may fail occasionally, then the next step is to harden our physical places against an attacker. You can generally break down "places" to mean a home, a place of business, a shed, a piece of property, a vehicle, a club house, etc, etc. All of those inanimate things have specific strengths and weaknesses. The idea is to make the weaknesses look like strengths and the strengths look like impossibilities. Let's look at a hypothetical home...

1. Windows.
   1. Obscure outside to inside visibility. Basically, the objective is to prevent a would-be intruder from conducting reconnaissance. If the potential intruder cannot establish your pattern of at-home-ness, or when you retire and when you arise, what your movements through your home are like, etc., then it will be much more difficult for him to formulate an entry plan. When faced with the possibility of breaking into a home which he has 1) no idea whether there are valuables there, and 2) whether or not he's likely to face the barrel of a pistol, or the muzzle of a doberman, even the most simple of minds is likely to try to find a softer target.
2. Doors.
   1. If your doors have windows in them, you should use the same tactics from the windows section. Basically, 1) you don't want folks to be able to see in, 2) you want them to see some indication that your windows and doors are protected by a recognized alarm system brand, that your possession are cataloged and insured. This is alleged to make it more difficult to sell stolen items to a pawn shop for example, though the skeptic in me suspects this is as much a marketing ploy on the part of insurance companies to get your money as it is an effective deterrent. 3) You want them to see some indication that the window is safety glass, or in someway hardening against removal so as to suggest that even if a bold intruder decides they could break the window to unlock a door, that the process would in fact NOT be quick, that it would be excessively time consuming and noisy, and may not even be successful potentially.
   2. You want the door to appear to be metal, or at least solid wood. If the hinges happen to be on the outside, you want have opened the door, drilled 3 or 4 holes along the length of the door and added nails into the swinging part of the door which when closed go into the drilled holes. This way if the pins from the hinges are removed, the nails and their aligned receiving holes in the jam will prevent the door from being removed from the hinges. You also want the would be attacker to KNOW that this has been done so they don't bother trying to remove the door and causing damage in the process. This can be accomplished with a sticker or some writing indicating "these hinges have been augmented with security devices designed to prevent the door from being removed by defeating the hinges".
   3. You want the door to have a deadbolt, and a separate latch associated with the opening mechanism. Basically, the more hardware extruding from the door into the door jam, the more widely dispersed the impact point would be in the event a battering technique is used to break the door down. With only a single point of extrusion into the jam, the door is significantly more easy to break in. With two or more extrusions spaced apart enough to distribute the force along more of the jam, the door becomes virtually impossible to batter. If you don't use this door often, or if you are "in for the evening", you can also employ a door bracer bar which attaches at one end to the floor and the other end to the door to further absorb batter energy, almost guaranteeing that the door jam will not have a chance to fail.
   4. You want the door and the jam extrusion points to be shielded with metal. Wood splinters with enough force, but metal can take a pounding. Get a metal C-casing for the extruding hardware. This is visible to intruders and a great deterrent to their even butting the door once or twice to see if they can break in.
   5. Optimally a metal door and metal jam. These can resist even the most effective battering rams, and are almost impossible for amateur battering techniques to defeat. However, this is expensive and may not be feasible for your circumstances. Mainly its offered as a best case scenario.
3. Door Jams.
   1. Visually you want the door jam to appear impenetrable. Functionally, you want the door jam to actually be impenetrable. Hopefully the visual effect will ward off any effort to breach it, and help you avoid the vandalism that accompanies such exploratory efforts. The main weaknesses associated with jams are as follows: 1) If the deadbolt and opening extrusions can be access through the jam, they potentially can be defeated (particularly if no deadbolt exists... then it may be as simple as jimmying the door with a knife.) 2) Outward facing hinges, while these are described with the door section, this is a weakness shared equally with the jam since it requires the jam and the door both to be modified in a hardening effort. The other potential problem jams offer is partial visibility. If you have a sloppy jam, (or if there is sufficient space under the door to see through) then someone scouting could observe traffic patterns through openings between the door and the jam. Not to mention if you are heating or cooling the space behind the door, you are also doing the same for the space on the other side of a sloppy door or jam and wasting money and energy unnecessarily.
4. Perceptions.
   1. Don't look like you have something valuable. This doesn't mean you need to drive junkers or wear sack cloth, but it does mean you shouldn't parade around in a Ferrari, wearing a Rolex and touting wads of cash or jewelry. At the risk of being misperceived of being sexist, it also means that (since most thieves are heterosexual males) you should not parade around your female better half in a bikini, short skirt, or with a thong hanging out the back of her pants. It's probably less of an issue outside of your neighborhood, such as at a mall, party, or whatever. Basically, you just don't want voyeurs and perverts following you home and marking you as a target for intrusion which could take on a far more sinister twist of events.
   2. Illness. If a potential attacker thinks there's a risk of catching a disease, that's a definite deterrent. When coupled with the perception that there's nothing valuable at your location, these combine to form a powerful case against burglary or intrusion for any purpose. It may also imply a negative stigma with your neighbors, but like the volume on your IPod, you just need to decide "how much" of the one vs. how much of the other you can tolerate to get a balance that deters intruders but doesn't make you the neighborhood leper.
   3. A dog. This one is an oldie but a goodie. You don't really need a dog, but let's consider two angles. First, you own a dog. Second, you appear to own a dog. If you actually own a dog, an intruder, upon intrusion will likely cause your dog to start barking. If your dog has a loud bark, this is a powerful deterrent to further intrusion. Upon hearing the barking, the intruder will realize that you are likely forewarned, and that the neighbors may well consider investigating the noise if even only out of annoyance. If you own a dog, but don't make it apparent to someone scouting your home as a potential target, you are missing out on another great deterrent. Even if you don't actually own a dog, appearing to own a dog may cause a would-be criminal to consider that your "dog" will begin barking and drawing a lot of unwanted attention before they gain access and have an opportunity to look for valuables. If the burglar doesn't know if, or where you store your valuables, the idea of a barking dog eliminates an search time he might have. Combined with other tactics, this is a really effective move and could easily cause a would-be intruder to pass you up in favor of a softer target.
   4. A gun, martial arts, or the threat of harm. This one is a dangerous and debatable tactic. I've heard compelling arguments suggesting that folks who keep a gun in the house are just as likely to have the tables turned and their own gun used against them as they are to effectively use it in stopping an intruder. That said, waking up in the middle of the night after hearing footsteps in the house and realizing you have nothing but your own fighting skills to ward off an intruder that may have a gun is a frightening event.

Additional Keywords: protect,your,home