Hot Off the Shelves: The Theftbox

December 17th, 2008

There are crimes of passion, crimes of insanity, and crimes of — gaming? Apparently so, now that a Missouri State University student had his Xbox 360 stolen from his dorm room. The student, constructions management major Ryan Ketsenburg, had just returned from a school trip only to find his game console missing the next morning.

While the theft was likely due to a less-than-smart move on Ketsenburg and his roommate’s part (they left the door unlocked), the criminal made his own blunder when he left one of the Xbox 360’s game controllers behind. Since these controllers are wireless, they become digitally linked to the user’s Xbox until they are synched with a new one and boast a range of up to 30 feet. That left Ketsenburg with the perfect means of pinpointing the whereabouts of his Xbox. Activating the controller, Ketsenburg was able to first narrow his suspects down to one floor of the dorm and then, after the RA (resident assistant) let him into one particularly suspect apartment, turned on his freshly found console via the same controller.

As Ketsenburg learned the hard way, no matter how safe your college of choice might appear during campus tours there’s always an element of uncertainty — especially when you don’t take the steps necessary for keeping yourself and your possessions safe. To bring you up to speed on what to do and what to look out for, we gathered some of the best of The CollegeBound Network’s articles on campus safety:

A Crash Course in Campus Security

Preventing Crime at College

College Campus Safety 101

Lest you get paranoid, remember that a college campus is about as safe as anywhere else. You just have to stay smart and exercise caution.

– Genevieve M. Blaber

Entry Filed under: College Craziness,News