Insecurity System - TV Tropes
- ️Mon Jul 02 2007
"Why is it so easy for children to break into the Pentagon?!"
If any facility has a security system, it will always be less secure and cooler looking than its real world counterpart. All sensor systems must be visually engaging, all traps must have a bypass that relies on pure pluck and guile. Lock-down sequences will require doors to close in sequential order, as opposed to all at the same time.
Some specific elements of the Insecurity System are defined below. Mix and match for an interesting infiltration.
The system need not be high tech in nature. Old-school temples and ruins can have implausible mechanical or mystical devices that serve the same function.
The real-world versions of several of these elements, and the Hollywood methods of defeating them, have been tested by the Mythbusters, frequently with surprising results.
Tropes:
- Absurdly Ineffective Barricade: Trying to keep a door from being opened by barricading it with stuff that won't effectively keep the door closed.
- Air-Vent Passageway: Sneaking in or out of a building through an air vent.
- Barrier-Busting Blow
- Bathroom Break-Out: Someone takes the opportunity to escape after they are given a bathroom break.
- Borrowed Biometric Bypass
- Camera Spoofing
- Caps Lock, Num Lock, Missiles Lock
- Cardboard Prison: Someone easily escapes from prison.
- Concealing Canvas
- Convenient Decoy Cat: Security guards are distracted by a cat (or other small animal), allowing the hero to get away.
- Death Trap Tango: A lot of Durable Deathtraps can be overcome with precise choreography.
- Destroy the Security Camera
- Durable Deathtrap
- Embarrassing Password: Someone uses a password that reveals an embarrassing secret about them.
- The Guards Must Be Crazy
- Hairpin Lockpick
- Hollywood Encryption
- "Home Alone" Antics
- Improvised Lockpick
- Incompetent Guard Animal
- Insecurity Camera
- It's Probably Nothing
- Key Under the Doormat
- Laser Hallway
- Magical Security Cam
- Metal Detector Checkpoint
- Oddly Overtrained Security
- One Password Attempt Ever
- Override Command
- The Password Is Always "Swordfish": Really simple passwords are used.
- Password Slot Machine
- Puzzle Box: The combination is a puzzle you need to solve.
- Recorded Audio Alibi
- Safe Cracking
- Security Blindspot: Someone knows where the holes in the surveillance are and uses them to their advantage.
- Self-Destructing Security
- Skeleton Key Card
- Slow Doors
- Surveillance Station Slacker: The guards who are supposed to be watching the monitors end up slacking off and not doing anything to stop people escaping or breaking in.
- Swiss-Cheese Security
- Trap Door
- Trap-Door Fail
- Unguided Lab Tour: A top-secret workplace is introduced by having a character explore it unnoticed.
- Unsafe Haven: A retreat that is ridiculously easy to break into.
- Neon Sign Hideout: A location that's supposed to be secret has a big neon sign that makes the place stick out like a sore thumb.
- Useless Security Camera
- You Are Already Checked In
- Your Door Was Open