Locksport: Lockpicking as a Hobby, Sport, and Security Conversation

An Older Idea: Hobbs and the Great Exhibition

Public lock challenges predate the word "locksport" by more than 150 years. In 1851 Alfred Charles Hobbs, an American locksmith representing Day & Newell of New York, came to London for the Great Exhibition. Joseph Bramah's firm had displayed a padlock in its shop window since the 1790s with an offer of 200 guineas to anyone who could pick or open it. Hobbs took up the challenge under agreed conditions: he worked on the firm's premises and the lock had to remain undamaged and working. According to the Linda Hall Library's account, he opened it after 51 hours of work spread over 16 days, using specially made instruments, and was paid the prize. He also opened a Chubb detector lock during the Exhibition. The Science Museum Group holds the Bramah challenge lock in its collection and credits Hobbs as the first person to pick it.

Hobbs also argued for openness. The Open Organisation Of Lockpickers (TOOOL) in the United States quotes his 1853 book Locks and Safes on its home page: "Rogues knew a good deal about lock-picking long before locksmiths discussed it," and the spread of that knowledge "is necessary to give fair play to those who might suffer by ignorance." The same argument runs through modern locksport. See Alfred Hobbs and Joseph Bramah.

Organized Clubs

Organized locksport began in Germany and the Netherlands in the late 1990s.

• SSDeV (Sportsfreunde der Sperrtechnik – Deutschland e.V.) is a registered German association. Wikipedia gives its founding year as 1997. SSDeV's own site, as read, does not state the year (decision X-01).
• TOOOL Netherlands says it was founded in Amsterdam in 2002 as the successor to the first Dutch lockpicking group, founded in 1997, and calls itself the oldest lockpicking sports club after SSDeV. A second chapter opened in Eindhoven in 2006.
• TOOOL US describes itself as a 501(c)(3) nonprofit "dedicated to advancing the general public knowledge about locks and lock picking through teaching, research, and competition," run by volunteers with chapters across the United States and an affiliated chapter in Canada.
• TOOOL Netherlands lists other national TOOOL groups as separate legal entities: TOOOL UK (2014) and TOOOL Australia (2018) among them, plus groups in Belgium and Norway that are no longer active.

Meetings are hands-on. TOOOL Netherlands chapters meet every other week, and newcomers get an explanation of how a lock works and why locks can be opened without damage at all. Membership is by invitation after attending a gathering, and visitors must give advance notice.

Competitions

Competitions measure skill on locks supplied by the organizers or brought by competitors. Formats vary by club and event. Some documented examples:

• TOOOL's continuous competition. TOOOL Netherlands runs a year-round competition on a fixed set of competition locks, which members can try repeatedly.
• The Dutch Open. TOOOL Netherlands hosts the Dutch Open lockpicking and impressioning competitions at LockCon, its annual international conference on mechanical and electronic locks, safe locks, and lock security.
• German championships. SSDeV reports that its 24th German Lockpicking Championship took place in Hamburg on November 15–17, 2024, with timed rounds on padlocks and cylinders and a round in which each competitor brings a lock that the others then attempt. SSDeV also runs a separate open German championship in impressioning, a technique covered at a conceptual level in our impressioning article.

Hacker and security conferences have also hosted lockpicking areas, often called lockpick villages, where visitors watch demonstrations and try practice locks.

Ethics and Rules

Clubs set their own rules, and they are strict. TOOOL Netherlands says the most important rule for members is "to only open locks that you have permission for to open from the owner." Its members avoid discussing opening doors or stealing bicycles, and the board acts if such topics are raised. The club says it cooperates with the authorities when officers come with a valid request.

Locksport groups also correct a common misunderstanding. TOOOL Netherlands notes that picking is not traceless: "The tools make scratches in the lock in places a key would never come into contact with." That is the basis of forensic locksmithing.

Legal status varies. TOOOL Netherlands states that lockpicking and owning a pick set are legal in the Netherlands. Laws on tool possession and use differ by country and, in the United States, by state. This article gives no legal advice. Check the law where you live.

Disclosure and Manufacturers

Locksport's public stance is that hidden flaws help attackers more than owners. TOOOL Netherlands says that if a technique poses a great risk to society, or a manufacturer fails to tell customers about a vulnerability, "then we blow the whistle," because "a weakness or flaw in a product can no longer be reversed." It cites key bumping as an example of a method that drew wide attention in Germany while remaining little known elsewhere.

Not everyone in the lock industry agrees with full public disclosure, and the debate continues.

Locksport and Lock Standards

Lab standards test some of the same skills that locksport practices, under controlled conditions. ANSI/BHMA A156.30, the standard for high-security cylinders, defines picking as "manipulating tumblers in a keyed lock mechanism through the keyway, without obvious damage, by means other than the specifically designed key," and includes pick-resistance tests at its security levels. Published summaries of UL 437 describe timed picking tests as well. A156.30 itself notes that its tests are performed under laboratory conditions and that results in actual use vary. See high-security locks and ANSI/BHMA lock grades.

Locksport and the Locksmith Trade

Skill at picking practice locks is not the same as working as a locksmith. Locksmithing covers installation, keying systems, door hardware, and codes, and some jurisdictions license it. Locksport is a hobby built around understanding locks. See locksmithing.

Related Topics

• Lockpicking: the concept and its limits
• Alfred Hobbs and Joseph Bramah
• Impressioning
• Security pins and sidebar locks: manufacturer responses to manipulation
• Forensic locksmithing
• High-security locks
• Key bumping

Sources