How do I protect my shop from teleporters?

Question

I live in a world where magic is common. Most people have enough magic to do simple tasks like lighting a candle or healing minor injuries. Higher magic is very rare, and those individuals mostly devote their time to the study of magical arts and science. In the last 100 years, there have been great leaps of scientific progress, which have improved the lives of everyone. Most devices harness an individual's magic power to perform complex tasks through technology. The most recent innovation was short range teleportation. Magic includes elemental magic, healing, limited psychokinesis, barrier spells, and other staples of the magic arts.

How it works:

Basically everyone has a Magically Amplified Common Application Watch (Macaw). The teleportation function runs off the Macaw. I imagine a location or punch it into the holographic display, snap my fingers and I'm there. At locations a significant distance away (5 miles+) the landing location starts to get imprecise. Teleports over 20 miles are discouraged for safety reasons. There is a "cooldown" time of about 10 minutes after each teleport to allow a person's magic to recharge.

Why it works:

Don't ask me, I'm a shopkeeper not a scientist. I asked an arcanist about it one time and all I got was science talk and magic theory. Way over my head. From my extremely limited understanding, it takes the common magic that everyone has and twists it through certain techno-apparatuses. Despite only being able to light candles with my own magic, I can now teleport like a master wizard. People can teleport with any goods they are carrying or wearing. Somehow the Macaw makes reasonably accurate decisions about what is "on their person".

The Problem:

While this new-fangled teleportation is great for day to day activities, it's a nightmare for security. I run a small jewelry store in downtown Technistadt. I sell a lot of small, lightweight, but high-value items, perfect for a potential thief. I want to be able to secure my items from a thief teleporting in and out of the shop while still remaining open for business. Several stores have already been hit by smash-grab-teleport robberies, and it's just going to get worse as this technology becomes more common.

Some options I've already considered:

• I've talked to the Macaw manufacturers. They told me they are not only unable to prevent people teleporting to a certain place, but all teleports are also untraceable. Seems like a major design flaw if you ask me.
• Teleportation will fail if the landing location is too small or otherwise unsafe. Not sure I can apply that to an open shop though.
• Some warehouse owner across town swears by his robot watchmen and poison gas traps. Good for him and all, but I'm trying to run a shop here, not a bunker. Whatever security measure I decide on could be visible to my customers, but shouldn't impede my business.

Answer 1

How about hanging birds and mobiles from the ceiling - something that's easily pushed aside by a person when they're in the shop but it removes the spaces that can be easily teleported in to.

Answer 2

Use your shop to display replicas of your jewels.

The easiest way to not have to worry about shoplifting is to not have anything to steal. Luckily, the MACAW offers an easy solution for this: simply keep all of your wares off-site and show your customers replicas of all of your jewels. Then, when a customer wants to purchase a jewel, you can simply have your assistant teleport in with the actual jewel for inspection and purchase.

With a 10-minute cooldown, you'll likely want two assistants. Every ten minutes, one will teleport to your warehouse with a list of all of the jewels people are interested in as well as any jewels that need to be transported back to the warehouse for safekeeping, and the other will collect those jewels and teleport back.

Answer 3

Retractable floor. At night, the shopkeeper presses a small garage door open/close style button that retracts that floor leaving the show cases suspended over a 20 foot deep pit (read as 'your basement') filled with 4 foot deep pool of a tarry slimy substance that's covered in feathers. A few hangings can prevent people from teleporting ontop of the cases and instead fall into the pit below when they teleport in.

Search for the criminal the next day by looking for a tarred and feathered thief. Filling the pool with red dye could create a more literal 'caught red handed' situation if you prefer.

Answer 4

If there is a 10 minute cool-down period, why do you have a security problem? They pop in, grab something, and...busted. Unless they are waiting around for 10 minutes and then popping out with said valuable.

In this case the answer is simple - no MACAW devices are allowed in the store. You could probably pay a wizard or witch to cast a MACAW barrier to the entrance of the store, preventing the device from entering through normal means.

If a MACAW pops in, your bouncers will be happy to collect the device and return it as the patron leaves. Bouncers are helpful like that.

EDIT You are right to need evening security as well. Here you can either go standard and lock everything up in a vault or lock boxes - very cumbersome and expensive. A better bet would be to install a security system and an overnight sleeping spell. They get in, motion detectors alert the authorities and the sleeping spell keeps the perps right where they are.

Arguably, you are building a "mouse trap", of sorts, but what is one to do in a magical society?

Answer 5

If a Macaw is able to precisely aim for a location and determine whether or not the user's dimensions can be accommodated, then it has a targeting sensor. If it has a targeting sensor, technological or magical, then it has a weakness, and someone would discover a way to fool it. Perhaps the device or application fools the sensor into thinking the space is full of hanging mobiles (or solid rock), perhaps it merely deflects the sensor to the perimeter, either way your Macaw won't deliver you to the desired location.

As a side-effect this device or application fools Macaws in the room into thinking they are elsewhere (or nowhere at all), which has the effect of preventing outbound teleportation. Turn on the device, or coat an object with it, and you've made it invisible to the Macaw and therefore safe from teleportation.

Now this may be beyond the abilities of a humble shopkeeper to come up with himself, but out there, somewhere, perhaps in a back-alley market, there is a solution to be purchased.

Answer 6

You know that annoying ink bomb (in our real world) that clothing stores sometimes forget to remove? Or those electronic tags that set off the door-alarms at Target? Attach those to your wares.

I assume that with the technology of this world, there is something akin to wireless communications, like Wi-fi. (Otherwise, how would MACAWS parse location data? Surely there is a Google-Maps-esque Internet (or, MACAWnet) database for locations)

Make the equivalent of ink bombs/electronic tags, that stay deactivated while connected to the Wi-fi in your store. When they're teleported out, they explode ink all over the thief/notify the police of the thief's location/etc.

Answer 7

Teleportation doesn't really change the nature of shop lifting. It is just a more effective method for what is currently accomplished by young legs and good running shoes. So do what we do in the real world...

Shatter-proof (bullet-proof before there was bullets) glass cabinets.

If the burglaries are all smash and grab, putting your products in floor-mounted smash-proof display cases will keep them from being grabbed.

Answer 8

In the day

Attach every item in the store to a thin, very strong wire that's fixed to something larger and ultimately to the wall or the floor itself. Customers can examine the items, but the items will remain fixed to the wire.

Here's what it looks like:

Video: INOX Stainless Steel Jewelry Anti-Theft Ring Display

I'm not sure exactly how the Macaw would handle an item that was both held by the user and fixed to the interior of the shop. Would the wire break? Would the whole wall teleport with the guy? Or would the item remain in the shop? I'm not sure, as I didn't invent the rules of this teleportation premise. But I think this wire is a feasible solution.

The items should also be stored beneath tough, hardened glass or another transparent material. Customers have to ask if they want to examine some item more closely.

The wire could be cut with the right tools but you or a security guard should be watching the customers while they handle the items. This is quite common in the real world. Salesmen don't just hand customers a Rolex and then let them wander off. It's normal to stay with customers while they examine expensive items (the salesman can also then give advice and assistance.) Thus, watching the customer, you'll have enough time to react if someone pulls out tools to try to cut the strong wires. There may also be an alarm sounding if a wire is cut. This means that even if a customer managed to stealthily cut a wire, they'd have to teleport out immediately, limiting their loot to one item. However, one single item can still be very valuable. Therefore, the most important thing is to watch the customers while they handle the items.

The shop should also be under video surveillance. This means that even if anyone would happen to trick all your routines, they should still expect that a picture of their face will be forwarded to the police.

In the night

You lock up the shop just like any shop in the real world. This means you have 10 minutes to act on Macaw intruders. A normal burglary alarm can detect people having entered. The alarm is forwarded to your private residence, as well as to a private security firm and possibly even the police. You (together with private, armed security personnel and maybe the police) use your own Macaws to teleport into the shop, catch the intruder and confiscate his Macaw, well within the 10 minute window.

Answer 9

Your security budget and posture will drive a lot of this.

One easy way to solve this is to have a safe, put all your valuables in the safe, and never allow any individual other than yourself to view the room containing the safe, or the interior of the safe. This prevents the 'must visualize' component of the MACAW from functioning. Your business would operate as many elite jewelers operate, whereby you emerge from a backroom to present the article for the customer's inspection. As it sounds like your sales volume may be a bit too high for this option, we have to move to something else.

I suggest the following security technologies:

• two-layer plexiglass containers with dead space in between the layers.
• sensitive disturbance sensor within the dead space
• glass break sensor with rapid response time inside the display case (to detect the smashing of the internal case)
• weight sensors with a rapid response time inside the display case (to detect the addition of a 'very heavy' object to the display case, like a midget or child teleporting inside the case).
• a remote triggering device for individual cases, tied to actuators available to the store's security staff
• taggant dispersal device (<1second between initiation and full dispersion) inside the central case containing the valuables, tied to the weight, glass break, and remote trigger.
• alarm to alert the security staff tied to the disturbance sensor between the internal and external cases.
• security staff sufficient to cover the store (based on your total square footage, this number may be as low as one if you have a small number of display cases and cannot fit more than three customers into your store while you and the security officer are present), armed with electrical control devices (and firearms if the jurisdiction permits).

You have several goals here

• defeat the ability of the thief to fence your goods
• lengthen the time between the first hostile act by the thief and the completion of the removal of the protected article
• prevent surreptitious removal of goods during off hours
• prevent non-teleporting theft
• avoid injuring patrons who inadvertently trigger security measures.
• alert the security staff to a theft in progress to permit intervention

A teleporting thief who enters the display case directly gets a face full of taggant. A store employee manipulating the jewelery does not. A miscreant or customer who smashes the external case triggers the intervention of security staff (everyone please step back while we help this customer to their feet and fix the case//eat taser u dirty thief//there are too many of these idiots, fire the taggant). A thief who smashes the external and internal cases without triggering staff intervention triggers the release of taggant before being able to activate his MACAW.

As far as the taggant goes, ideally, magically enabled 'tracking goo', invisible without special equipment or magic, that the local PD can track well enough to teleport to the thief and retrieve them within the ten minute window would be perfect.

As for the dispersion device, ideally it is silent, invisible and unobtrusive (so it can be triggered during an armed assault without exposing the store staff to additional risk), but the old glowsitcks-ducktaped-to-flashbang could work too if you do not have access to fancy tech.

Answer 10

My first thought is to take advantage of that ~10 minute cool down. Seeing as there isn't an existing method of tracking/preventing teleportation and the shopkeep doesn't/can't comprehend how the device functions; that means we should cope with the fact that these break ins are likely to happen. Let's assume the shop is going to be broken into.

Seal the shop

These break-ins aren't likely to happen during operating hours, so naturally the shop should be locked. Install a set of motion trackers inside the shop that are designed to set off defense systems only during off hours/days.

Now we have the thief; they teleport in, grab for the first thing they want to steal, and the system detects the motion. Use this to trigger a system that seals the shop (as much as is physically possible for this world and is within reason for the shop owner). Now, the thief isn't too worried because they can teleport out in about ten minutes. That's when you trigger the second system, a series of gas traps (because your neighbor actually has a really good idea). This puts the thief in an unconscious state. At best they're trapped in the shop with a bunch of gas and were smart enough to bring a gas mask. This is why you also set off an alarm that alerts that appropriate authorities and lets them know exactly what to expect.

Answer 11

Teleportation will fail if the landing location is too small or otherwise unsafe. Not sure I can apply that to an open shop though.

Here's the tricky thing about teleports: the landing location is always inherently "too small or otherwise unsafe", because no matter where they're teleporting into--assuming we remain reasonably close to the planet's surface, of course--it's going to be full of air that can't exist in the same place at the same time as the person.

Normally this isn't much of a problem, since the air will move out of our way as we walk around, and flow around us to fill in the space we just vacated. But if our movement through space isn't continuous because we're teleporting, we've got some serious physical problems to work out in order to take care of all that air. And I'm assuming that someone did work it out somehow if the technology is in common use, because if the air stays in the same place as you appear, it could get mixed in with your body, and that can really ruin your whole day.

This means that whatever's being teleported has to displace all that air. If you want a general idea of the effects of sudden air displacement, blow up a balloon and then stick it with a pin, and keep in mind that this is a very small amount of air, both by mass and by volume. Having an amount of air equivalent to an adult human be suddenly displaced would be very noticeable, and more to the point, it would have to happen before the person teleports in, so they don't get embolisms and die.

If there's magical technology to make this happen, then there should be a way to detect the sudden air displacement. Set up a continuous spell that monitors for it, and when it happens, forces a bunch of air directly into the space being evacuated. By the description offered, this would probably cause the teleportation to fail. If not, it would really ruin the thief's day.

Answer 12

This assumes that your teleporting doesn't magically push things aside to make room for your arrival. Get a bunch of metal cable, and create a grid of spools in the ceiling in a grid about a foot apart. Each cable will have a weight attached to it that, and is long enough to go from floor to ceiling.

In the evening, you let the cables down so the entire interior of your shop has floor-to-ceiling cables. Depending on how the teleporting determines space, they either won't be able to port in, or they will port in and will be skewered with a cable in them.

In the morning, you crank the cables back up into the ceiling.

So you need to clarify two questions as well:

1. Does the teleportation brush aside objects where you might land, or does it shunt you nearby? At what size/mass of object? Wires, rods, solid cement? (Heck, even dust... Do you suddenly get filled with dust when you port into a dusty room?

2. How precisely do you have to know or imagine a target location? Do you have to know any details of the shop, or do you just imagine a shop by name? What if the shop is fictional? Can you just imagine "I want to go to Betty Crocker's (a fictional character) kitchen and somehow you will go somewhere?

If you or someone has to have some physical knowledge of the target location, you could defeat teleportation that way: have the shop change its internal configuration on a continuous and mechanical way so there's no way that anyone can know what the shop is like now. Or blindfold people before escorting them beyond the foyer, and they examine jewels while inside secure viewing rooms, never seeing the location where the jewels are stored.

Answer 13

There are a number of possibilities, depending on which target is being protected against: open hours shoplifting, or after hours shenanigans.

First, open hours shoplifting. This would consist of people attempting to grab and item and absconding via a teleport. Since teleportation cannot be blocked usually, there is really no way of preventing people from teleporting out of your store.

This devolves into two main options - removing access to MACAWs via something like a "check your MACAWs at the door" policy combined with a MACAW detector of some kind - or having an magically or mechanically automated vault system of some kind where product is represented holographically, with false-models for those who wish to touch, feel, and heft; once a purchase is completed the system would be delivered to the counter via pneumatic tubes/trained mongoose/dancing gerbils/trained birds (i suggest macaws)/magical constructs/etc, from a secure location which product is stored.

This location would store items in close proximity such that at no time is there space that a human would fit, and delivers via a small method that also humans could not fit or intrude upon. Larger items would have to have some method of being picked up from the vault, probably by an assistant and teleported to the shop.

In-store items would need to be inside cases that a human would not fit in, and would also need to be made of a suitably strong material... I suggest clear-steel. Solid metal enchanted specially to be completely transparent.

After hours protection for the vault system, since it is too small for a human to teleport inside, would consist of access prevention, and proximity detection methods, similar to preventing anyone from entering a bank vault. In-store protection should be fairly easy, one simply needs to make the space un-safe. Retractable hanging wires/tinsel or something similar would fill the space where people walk through. Teleporting into a solid object, or having a solid object inside of you at teleport-end equals un-safe in pretty much everyone's books. As such, the teleport should fail every time. Therefore, you are left merely with more normal access prevention, just like everyone else.

Answer 14

MACAW units seem like amazingly handy personal devices. However, the fact that they're so small and so multi-functional means they're probably not nearly as capable (at any one specific task) as a single-purpose industrial-sized state-of-the-art machine.

(In much the same way that our modern-day smartphones aren't as powerful as our desktop computers, which aren't as powerful as large-scale supercomputers.)

The company producing MACAW units probably has cross-country transporter hubs in major cities. These large-scale stationary units, being much higher-powered and much more directionally focused (pre-calibrated for very specific startpoint-to-endpoint paths), are capable of sending travelers 1000+ miles safely while hardly affecting a passenger's personal-magic recharge time.

Similarly, a medium-sized, stationary (and well-calibrated) "portal" unit could be installed between a storefront and the actual store itself 50+ miles away. This benefits shop-owners in multiple ways:

• Location, Location, Location
  Prime real estate is expensive. Mainstreet may be the best place to get foot-traffic into your store but every square-foot of floor space costs good money. Portals could let a store-owner build a large shop on cheap land while staying connected to a good foot-traffic location. Furthermore, a single store could have multiple "locations" if the savvy owner buys additional storefront locations that all connect back to their main shop.
• Storefront / Store / Warehouse
  Bespoke items like jewelry and tailor made clothing may be created/altered in "the back room" of a store, but if land is expensive it's often the case that items are shipped back and forth to a secondary location/warehouse where workspace is less expensive. Portals allow shop owners to build their stores attached to their warehouse/workspace. This would mean a shopkeeper could keep an eye on both the front-of-house and back-of-house portions of his or her business more easily. It also means a clerk can easily "check in back" to see if a sold out item might have any more stock.
• Security
  Finally, the reason the OP was specifically asking about. Since portals separate the storefront from the actual store, that means the store can be built someplace that discourages unauthorized MACAW transport. If a store is 50+ miles deep into the Earth or 50+ miles out in orbit no one is going to dare to transport there free-style with their MACAW (or try transporting back for the same reason) and therefore the only way in or out is through the "front door". Therefore typical lock-down security measures become effective again. In practice, the store locations need not be quite that remote or inhospitable so long as they still "might be" and no one is willing to test whether their getaway location is actually within MACAW distance, but I guess that all depends on how well magic-GPS works and whether or not it can be tricked/spoofed.

Answer 15

You think of it as a problem. Rather, it's an opportunity.

• To solve the security problem:

  • Magically create a pocket dimension. Assemble your shop there.
  • Buy a shop (I recommend downtown Technistadt.)
  • Create a portal that links the physical door to the entrance of your pocket dimension shop.

This way, teleporters will land on an empty shop. Here comes the opportunity!

• Benefiting from malicious teleporters:
  • Grow a Gelatinous Cube on your shop, filling the whole room.
  • Befriend a Greater Doppelganger. (Don't ask me how.)
  • When a teleporter arrive, he/she will be paralyzed by the Cube.
  • Let Big Doppy absorb its memories and appearance.
  • Retrieve all valuable possessions from the late teleporter.
  • Profit!

Answer 16

During the day you souldn't have much of a problem, just forbid MACAWs like somebody else suggested.

During the night you could just store all your valuables in a safe. They can't teleport directly inside because it's too small and if they just teleport near the safe they'll have to crack it first, at which point it becaomes almost identical to any traditional robbery.

Another method would be to hide valuables during the night, if the thief doesn't know where they are he can't teleport to them. This effect could be amplified by using traps. Even if the thief takes a guess thinking that, at worst, he'll teleport into an empty room and have to wait 10 mintues, you can fill the rooms with traps so that the thief will teleport into a pool of water containing venomous fish, if you don't want to kill them (the water would short-circuit the MACAW and the fish would incapacitate the thief) or over a spike pit if you want to kill/severely injure them.

Yet another method would be to attack ropes with bells on the ceiling. During the day these are raised, during the night they are lowered so that any thief will set them of after teleporting in, giving you (and/or your employees) 10 minutes to apprehend him.

You could also use the MAKAW against the thieves; attach one to every case (they're not lying around in the open where any pickpocket could grab them, right?) so that when it is opened or smashed the MAKAW will teleport it to a location known only to you. Or just inside a safe.

Answer 17

The essential problem is with thieves teleporting out of the store, not with thieves teleporting in. In is easy to solve.

Puppy Dogs

Specifically, any teleporting magic will have to push out of the way any matter in the way of the incoming body. It is a lot harder to push out solid matter than air, so you're better off teleporting into non objects. That said, any displacement will cause sound and a distinctive one at that: a pop with accompanying minor air pressure shift. Easy to train a dog to get on that right quick: a tried and true method for property protection. Thieves are less likely to mess with you if they know they could get their leg chewed on. Plus real customers have a hard time ignoring the cute. It adds character to your shop!

(Note that it's likely people will quickly form etiquette to not suddenly show up inside places, as in the Vladimir Taltos novels.)

CROWs

The actual problem is thieves leaving. You've already mentioned a communication and reference watch, so we know magic exists that can communicate. All you need as a shop owner at this point is some magic that tags customers as they come in. A "cookie" if you will: Communication Originated by Offending Kleptos Intradimensional Exit. Any one passing into the store has a temporary charm laid on them that notifies the police CROW where they are should they leave the barrier area not through the door.

At this juncture it's just a police case like it would be in a normal shoplifting scenario. And the thing is: it needn't be a perfect measure. It just needs to be better than the warehouse owner's measures, so thieves know to go for the low hanging fruit. (That guy really should have utilized the choo choo train idea.)

Answer 18

This is similar to a real-world problem that has largely been solved: shops in airports and train stations. We don't have the ability to magically teleport, but slipping away into a large crowd is disappearing all the same.

Airports solve this a number of ways. Anything that's out in the open and easily grabbed is a low-value item, like a magazine or a bag of candy (not worth the expense of elaborate security). Higher-value items are sold either by vending machine or in a manned kiosk. In either case, merchandise is locked inside a cabinet until paid for. Customers can still see the goods and ask employees questions, but your merchandise isn't at risk. Jewelry is a bit more difficult since it normally needs to be tried on, but a holographic display and cheap costume jewelry replicas can eliminate a lot of that problem.

When the merchandise is locked inside a display cabinet until after the sale, you largely take the teleporter out of the equation. You'd need the same basic security as in the real world - sturdy, tamper-resistant cabinets; security cameras; alarms; guards; etc - which I'm assuming would be much cheaper than elaborate traps or magic-powered security devices. The only advantage a thief would gain from a teleport is the ability to grab something from a customer after they've purchased it and blink away, but that's not a problem you're going to be able to solve. This sort of teleport technology would be a dream come true for a purse snatcher or pickpocket, and I'd expect most thefts would occur out in public since that presents a wealth of much softer targets.

Answer 19

I've talked to the Macaw manufacturers. They told me they are not only unable to prevent people teleporting to a certain place, but all teleports are also untraceable. Seems like a major design flaw if you ask me.

So talk to their competitors instead. Someone else will come up with a security spell to either block the teleportation in one direction or the other, or worse, as a deterrent, cause anyone teleporting in to materialize inside-out.

Answer 20

1. Seal your shop so it has no doors leading into the interior.
2. Create a receiving area, which is one room attached to the shop and visible through windows, into which you invite your customers to teleport, with clear and large signs.
3. Limit the time your customers spend in the shop to 10 minutes. They may leave through a one-way exit door and teleport back into the receiving area in order to continue shopping.
4. Only allow the number of people into the shop at once that can be observed by you and your staff. This could be just one, or 10--but whatever will be the number that you will not be distracted and fail to notice a new person arriving.
5. To enforce the 10-minute limit by keeping the number of customers small enough to manage, post signs that say "Any teleportations arriving inside the shop outside of the receiving area will be shot on sight." Shoot people on sight who teleport into the shop outside of the receiving area.

At night time, all your display cases lower into the floor with machinery (themselves being too small in internal compartments for anyone to teleport into) and are concealed with many-inch-thick steel plates. For all you care, the walls could even retract so everything is open to the air and there is no temptation to break in--just walk into what amounts to a sideless patio. There is nothing to pick--the machinery is operated using magic (that amounts to a password that is impossible to guess).

Answer 21

If a macaw is small enough to fit on someone's wrist, then there is no reason why a macaw can be installed as part of the entire shop. Now a smash and grabber teleports in to rob your shop, the macaw immediately teleport-ejects any potential thief from teleporting in. Security by teleportation.

However, there will need to be a selection mechanism to prevent legitimate shoppers from being ejected. There could be a welcome area where shoppers can teleportatively land and be vetted as shoppers and not thieves. Landing anywhere else in the shop will lead to automatic ejection.

Answer 22

After the introduction of the MACAW our firm is proud to present the PUT, the Pinpoint Undulation Transmitter. These piece of strips will move the desired teleportation point a small distance to a strip, allowing you to pinpoint your location within a thumb's width. The modulation phase of the strip does not influence the height of the location, this will be completely unchanged.

Please remember that the translation effect begins in the range of 3 steps and forces a pinpoint landing within the range of 1-2 steps. The strips can be easily detached and incinerated on the fly. We also offer strips which destroy themselves without a trace after usage.

WARNING: Please do not use a strip inside or near a wall, this can cause instant death or severe mutilation of body parts.

Magic World News, 10 Springmonth After the introduction of the new PUTs a strange series of "accidents" haunts the usage of the MACAW. Several people have been found dead or screaming with severe mutilations inside other's peoples stores and houses. Other people have found themselves inside cages, fish tanks or sewage containers. The PUT company denies any involvement and says that there is currently not a shred of evidence that their product is responsible and, even if there would be a connection, their legal disclaimer is bullet-proof.

The MACAW company admits that it is not impossible to have deviations of meters, but they say it is very rare and they never found a serious deviation when used in the open field.

Answer 23

Most of these answers seem too complex, no need for nerve gas and Faraday cages.

Nighttime:

Bar up the display cases. Most people bar up their shops, but now the thieves can get past that, so simply move the bars further in. With the right set of bars and locks you can stop all but the most determined thieves. For that case, that is what insurance is for.

Daytime:

A gun.

Answer 24

I know there are a lot of answers to this already.

But there is a very simple, mundane solution that is being overlooked.

The question expressly states that these Macaw things are wearable. Why not just ask people to remove their Macaw when they enter the shop, and then give them back when customers leave?

Sure, people could try teleporting in so their Macaw isn't confiscated at the door, but then they would be on cooldown for ten minutes and could easily be detained. It's a small jewelry store, so there's really nowhere you could teleport in without being seen.

On top of that, even in a world with zero magic, small stores that sell valuable items are very likely to have a security camera. Sure, robbers can teleport every ten minutes, but so can the police.

Answer 25

The ideal solution would be something akin to a lodestone for teleports. Anyone trying to teleport in to the shop lands in a receiving room, which could be nice and open and a regular way to travel to the shop. (possibly with a nice door chime) Anyone trying to teleport out of the shop would likewise land in the receiving room, with ringing bells etc. the door could be locked from the inside, and customers need to be "buzzed" out.

At night the room could be far less nice, and less open. :)

Answer 26

The simplest method to prevent a would be thief from teleporting into a store would be to surround the entire structure with a device that behaved like a Faraday Cage.

A Faraday Cage can block out electromagnetic waves including high voltage electricity, as well as radio waves, television waves, WiFi signals, etc. It should also prevent the electromagnetic waves from passing inside of it from a teleporter as well.

The owner would simply need to have a cage built around the store so the thieves cannot teleport inside.

Answer 27

Due to the cooldown, teleporting into the shop is really no concern since people will use the device to teleport out, not in. That's why the accepted answer will only deter real customers and provide absolutely no defense against real thiefs.

In theory, you'd use the same methods used today:

• Insurance
• Overnight safes
• Cameras, or other means of identification
• Law enforcement

In practice, law enforcement is completely useless because they can't arrest anybody - any bad guy who's stopped by law enforcement will just teleport to a random untraceable location before their identity can even be established.

Because law enforcement wont be able to arrest anyone - be it thief, murderer, rapist, or slaver - society will crumble, and you will face looters rather than thieves. What you really should do is sell your shop while you still can, buy/build a hidden bunker, store lots of food, and wait for the inevitable collapse of civilization.

Answer 28

Install a CITY (Crystal Induction Transparency Yard) in your store. And then encase all of your goods in a block of MAPP (Magically Altered Pseudo-Plastic).

The properties of MAPP are:

• Generated by a CITY, in the shape the user desires
• Resists scrying
• Nearly transparent while in the matching CITY
• When removed from the matching CITY, becomes opaque and black
• When removed from the matching CITY, emits a loud, annoying tone
• Can be dissolved harmlessly while within the matching CITY, but only with a specific, magic key (as in a spell and password, not a physical key)
• If damaged (even in the CITY), the damaged layers transform into a highly corrosive substance that does not damage the remaining MAPP

The CITY is generated by a special, specific crystal, and the energy of the person who charges it. One charge (about the same energy as one teleport) will last 64.8 hours, but the crystal can hold up to five charges (to allow for vacations). Because the CITY relies on both the shape and structure of the crystal, and the specific energy of the user, it is nearly impossible to duplicate.

Even if the goods are stolen, they will be difficult to sell if the buyer can't see what they are (or hear what the thief is saying). And if the thief tries to dig them out, he risks injuring himself, and destroying the jewelry; either by hitting it because he can't see it, or by having it dissolved by the MAPP corrosive.

Any legitimate customer can still see the goods.

And they are easier to display and store because each it in its own transparent cube/rectangular prism.

Answer 29

People teleporting in or out don't really matter. What matters is your stuff getting teleported away. Well, there's a market for disposable security labels like this one:

Typical set should consist of label-sealing device (unless they are self-sealing), label-removing device (ideally only working if it's provided with the same code as label-sealing device, only at working hours and inside the store) and a ton of labels - those are expendables and producer would be making his profits off them mostly.

If you sell a thing, you remove a label from it (or deactivate the label).

Those labels should be as small as possible so they don't deface your goods. Having met that, they could be as cool as you would allow them to be - maybe having some alarm system onboard or even means of subduing the carrier - but that's not necessairy. Local cops would love the device that automatically notifies about thief with evidence on him any cop that walks by.

Systems from the same vendor could collaborate so alarm is triggered for any label out-of-its-place, even if it's from another store (so your thief would be busted while walking past some supermarket, for example), but that really depends on pricing and may be unfeasible.

If MACAW technology can be applied over arbitrary shapes you have a much bigger problems though.

Answer 30

Assuming 5 miles is the maximum you can teleport accurately, simply(!) build your shop in a location that is inaccessible within 5 miles.

This could be a bunker under the ground, in a mountain, or even floating high up in the sky.

If you built it 5 miles beneath the ground, and put a secure building above it (something impossible to teleport into, for example by making it heavily trapped or with a security system that is manually disabled during the day) then no-one would be able to get into the shop unless they teleport from above during working hours.

You could extend this, to having to teleport twice to enter the shop, by building your ship 10 miles under ground and having a 'stop' half way where while you recharge. This will stop you from being able to flee if something is stolen.

If there are any materials or signal jammers that can shorten the 5 miles then this will help in constructing it closer to the surface.

However...

A much simpler method however would simply be to have a pressure plate that measures the weight of everyone in the room. If someone spontaneously appears the building goes on lock down (or if it's night, the intruder is shot or sprayed with jam).

Answer 31

Every one here seems to be considering ways to thwart the M.A.C.A.W. If it is amplifying a persons innate magical ability, then all one has to do to prevent it is remove that ability or lessen it to the point they can only teleport a few feet.

Larson's Botanical Lexicon states that

"witch-bane: is harmless to most creatures, excepting those that need magical energies to maintain shape or form. In the case of willfully wielded magic it will counteract that in the conjurer which allows him cast the spell."

In that effect, I have heard tell that it emits quite a pleasurable odor that may also have an added affect of soothing difficult negotiations.

Answer 32

There is something that seemingly went unnoticed. MACAW is said to be using personal magic of the wearer/user and an advanced magical techno-device.

It means that there should be means for personal identification of owned magic on activation and during usage of the device as usually magic is considered unique for every single being.

Of course it may be hard to prevent actual theft, however shopkeeper should be able to identify (and register) their clients (in cooperation with local authorities and law execution against theft and forgery).

That would mean, any thief could teleport out, but once he does it, he will be noticed and locked on for law enforcers.

He may try to escape, but they will find him if he ever uses MACAW in public space and teleport-in on immediate notice. As result the thief would stand out proportionally to casuality of MACAW usage, which would pick up interest of normal people.

In fact that would also mean, any unknown customer going into any shop by foot would alert the staff. Maybe there would be some hand-scanners or gates?

Of course the shopkeeper should also implement some measures to actually prevent theft in case somebody will be able to fool M(agical)ID system and to keep own goods. Even more, it is easy to understand that simple shopkeepers wouldn't trust MID and would instead use some methods of their own.

Also, the MID system could be not implemented at the same time as other options of MACAW as it's inventors haven't thought about security in the first place. Still worried by stories of your (and other shopkeepers) experiences with new kind of theft they decided to develop MID, which also allowed for MACAW to miraculously solve problems of identification and forgery bringing them in result even more profit.

The ways of cracking MID would need some sort of modulator, which probably would be illegal and (lethally) dangerous combined with amplification provided by MACAW and those would be probably out of concern for simple shopkeepers who decide to keep their business save by own means.

Answer 33

My idea is similar to what is already proposed here. For the working hours you just rely on the normal safety measures - locked cabinets, shatterproof glass and so on. There is no appreciable difference between someone teleporting in your store and grabbing something and someone just quickly running in and out.

In fact, due to the 10 minute cooldown on teleportation, the main problem during the walking hours is a thief walking in normally and then teleporting out. There is a number of precautions you will take - not giving precious rings to try on to suspiciosly looking clients, using thin metal wires to secure the items you give to try on, etc. But in the end you will just have to try to risk it, and remember the faces of your clients. It's just the same risk that someone will grab a ring and run away with it, and not much you can do with that.

The biggest problem, as I understand, however, is someone teleporting inside when the shop is closed and quietly robbing it from the inside. So here is my idea - you plan a shop in such way that it is possible to completely change the layout of the place in short time. The cabinets and shelves can move - either on wheels, or on rails, or magically. There are curtains of different colors that you can pull up or let down, there are movable lightweight walls and sliding doors. In short, with comparatively little effort (the effort spent should be not much bigger then lock and secure each cabinet - something that a person running a jewelry shop would already do) you make the place unrecognizable.

Since the inside of the shop now looks much differently then when it was open, the shelves and cabinets are where open spaces were, and, conversely, the open spaces are where shelves and cabinets were, the curtains and walls are of different colors and half of the walls are in different places, nobody who was in your shop by day will not be able to teleport in at night, going by the memory.

Answer 34

History has a solution, sleep in your shop.

Just do what medieval shops actually did, shops were one room buildings, buildings you were not allowed in, you bought things through an open window. You rarely could even enter shops, shops you could enter kelp everything behind counters and out of reach. The idea of shops you could just walk into and wander around is completely modern. Purchases were up close and personal. This design also meant craftsmen could work while selling, essential for craftsman.

At night you have even less of a problem because most shopkeepers slept in their shops. A separate room for sleeping was for nobility not craftsmen. You don't even need to fight them just see their face and go to the guards, punishment for thieves was brutal.

If your shop is so large you can't watch all of it, you are doing so much business and have so much money you can easily afford a few guards to watch it around the clock. the only other way craftsmen would sell things was orders (no theft risk) or booths in which case everyth applies to the normal shop just more so, the booth is small and easy to keep an eye on and the workshop is even more secure since again they would be sleeping in it. The exceptions are shops you could not sleep in like tanners or blacksmith forges, in those cases the finished goods would be in room people slept/lived in and only unfinished goods in the unoccupied rooms.

As a bonus this works on normal thieves as well.

Answer 35

How about a simple set of rules to prevent this?

Teleporting inside and then out takes 10 minutes at minimum. So the easiest way is to have a safe destination pre-coded into the Macaw, run in to grab stuff and teleport out to circumvent the cooldown and you are home free.

So the first security measure is that people have to leave their Macaw at the door when they come looking at jewelery, with one of those security doors that can only be opened from the inside so that anyone with a mask can be stopped or forced to teleport inside and take 10 minutes at minimum.

At night you lock the stuff behind things that take time to open and expand security measures to have a lasergrid across the entire floor and other standard security that gives you a minute to punch in the code before it goes off (even better, only you know where the securitypad is and teleport there directly each day). This stops the more opportunistic thieves from just teleporting in and taking stuff. It also helps against more determined thieves that will undoubtedly pick the faster option of using a vehicle to smash your shop and get at the jewels. There is never a guarantee, but it could help.

Naturally police would have Macaws with pre-coded destinations for risky businesses. Police would only need to drive to within 8km of the destination, and looking at London for example then on average you have 1 to 2 entire stations within range... so basically the moment an alarm goes off you are knee-deep in police that want to have a word with you. Your Macaw would mean crime has it tougher, rather than easier for large scale crimes like these.

Answer 36

@Twelfth's answer makes the most sense to me, but as @vsz and @JoshPart point out, in any case you need to prevent someone from teleporting out with a piece they're examining, admiring, etc., during normal hours of operation.

To this end, I would say a barrier or spell could disable use of Macaws within the store's bounds. Even simpler, a notice that "Macaws are not permitted in the store" is an option, similar to "Gun free zone" in our world, although that doesn't actually guarantee anything whatsoever, as it does not in our world either. It's cheaper though, until you rack up the capital to rent one of those expensive wizard's skills.

Answer 37

Simply seal the shop and fill it with nerve gas. Then you can sleep knowing that anybody coming to take your stuff won't be leaving with it. There are numerous roughly-equivalent ideas, such as electrifying the floor.

Answer 38

Not sure how much technology you have, but assuming it's advanced enough, you could use something like this, which was used in Agents of SHIELD to stop their teleporter. The episode seems to imply that it keeps teleporters out as well as trap them inside.

Answer 39

custom teleportation devices

Your wares are somewhere safe. When someone wants to buy at your store then you ensure that this person doesn't wear a macaw and then grab the hand of the customer and teleport him with you. Just like porting in the Harry Potter world (i. e. Gandalf at the metro).

Of course this assumes that one can not only grab priceless gems and teleport away but also people.

Because you teleported these people to your secret location and you ensured they don't have any teleporting/tracking device with them they cannot simply grab and port away. Plus someone from outside doesn't know where you actually put all those valuable gems.

If you cannot port other people you could provide your customers with specially-fit Macows. Instwad of having access to arbitrary many functions they only got "goto shop" and "go back" Buttons. Thus they can port themself without actually having to know the locations themself. Of course these devices would be handed out by clerks under the above stated conditions and taken away once the customer wants to leave the shop.

Of course this is Security by Obsurity. Meaning that once someone knows your "secret" location they can pretty much work around the whole Custom-Macow-Thing.

Answer 40

Use the cooldown time to your advantage.

So, the MACAW allows you to teleport pretty much anywhere you like, with a cooldown of 10 minutes.

All you have to do is make the shop's entrance inaccessible.

This forces customers to enter your shop by using their teleportation, which means they cannot teleport back out until 10 minutes later. This should significantly raise the barrier of entry for thievery.

Have a mostly-empty waiting room attached to the shop, where customers go if they want to leave. Have security give them a patdown to thwart shoplifting, then allow the customers to teleport out once their cooldown ends.

Nighttime thievery

Now that the shop's entrance is inaccessible, would-be cat burglars are required to stay in your shop for at least 10 minutes because they have to teleport in. Have a security member patrol the interior, or cover the area with CCTV and have security teleport inside when needed.