Backpack WIGGLE Trick: Stop Thieves & Pickpockets!

Backpack WIGGLE Trick: Stop Thieves & Pickpockets!

The material your backpack is made of How It’s zipped and the way you wear it can all make a huge difference in how vulnerable it is to a thief but a simple movement can bring all of those defenses together and make a pickpocket think twice before choosing you as their next

Target hi everybody foxnomad here and today I want to help you travel smarter by showing you a security move that you can add to your bag of tricks that’s effective really easy to do and can protect your valuable items in tight space and it all it all comes down to a wiggle

Backpacks and day packs are one of the most difficult pieces of travel gear to secure for a few reasons one they’re mobile so your backpack gets exposed to a lot of people much more than if it’s sitting alone in a hotel room and two backpacks are often designed to be light

So the materials used for the exterior and the straps might be vulnerable to being cut three backpacks are conspicuous they stand out and it’s pretty obvious when you’re wearing one and four backpacks are usually out of your line of sight because they’re on your back which happens to be one of the

Least sensitive parts of your body it’s these last two points and vulnerabilities that we’re going to focus on and where this wiggle trick comes in most handy when you’re walking around in Open Spaces it’s fairly easy to keep your backpack secure there aren’t a lot of people around you and if

Someone approaches you somewhere within your line of sight or peripheral vision it’s likely to catch your attention but in tighter spaces like crowded Town squares Metro cars or Mark kits where your senses are distracted and there are people all around things get a little bit more difficult so the first step is

To tighten your backpack straps as much as comfortable and get your backpack to sit high up on your back that’s not only better for your posture and lower back muscles it also puts more pressure and increases the contact area your backpack straps have on your upper trapezoids the

Trapezoids are these muscles which go across the top of your back also down the center and they happen to be where you have the most sensitivity and the most nerve endings on your back this is important because if somebody tries to sneak into your backpack you’re more

Likely to feel the movement if it happens up here rather than down here tight backpack straps will naturally make unnatural movements like side to side more perceivable since the movement across your shoulders is more likely to get your attention but even if you wear your backpack on your front in tight

Spaces it can be tough to keep an eye on it plus your pockets and not step on people all at once and this this this is where you wiggle in tight spaces a random little wiggle like this can be just enough to throw off a stealthy pickpocket hand pickpockets often work

By distracting your senses with a bump or a push which in empty spaces would be weird and definitely set off alarm Bells but on a crowded Subway is normal and expected pickpockets are looking for a moment of distraction and time it with rhythm the regular jostling of the train

Or people moving on and off at a stop just watch people’s backpacks the next time you’re on public transportation and you’ll see it too you’ll notice that as Metro cars sway or people walk around or go up and down escalators that their backs and their backpacks are relatively

Stable that lack of motion means a standing Target in a lot of ways and for a pickpocket the additional movement or random wiggle that you would add makes it more of a deterrent makes it just more of a difficult Target and they’re very more likely to just move on to the

Backpack that’s easier to get to they know most people’s movements are predictable and can time their movements with the rhythm of yours but you can easily add some chaos some unpredictability to your movements all with a wiggle this is something I’ve done for years and I’ve actually seen it

Work in action remember the backpack wiggle is just that it’s just a little wiggle like that on occasion it’s not a constant motion that you’re not just constantly shaking everywhere and the motion comes from your shoulders so you want to just kind of add this little motion from your shoulders from time to

Time in cases where you’re on a crowded Metro crowded Town Square like I said where there are people around you around your things you can just do that to you know just to do also a little bit of a spot check to make sure that your bag

Feels the same that it feels like everything is there it feels tight there’s no restriction there’s no hand that’s you know on your bag or anything like that and if you want to add more security you can just move your backpack around to your front like

This and also add the wiggle there too if you need a random little movement a few centimeters side to side on occasion about every few seconds makes you a moving Target in a c of statues pickpocket hands are generally repelled by these kind of random motions because

A pickpocket wants to be quick and stealthy although the backpack wiggle might seem like a small thing and it is a small thing just a few cmet side to side it does two things that pickpockets and thieves don’t like they don’t want to spend too much time making the steel

And they don’t want to get notice to get caught so this backpack wiggle does two of those things one by making your motion just a little bit less predictable it takes the amount of time a pickpocket would take to get into your bag since it’s a little bit of a moving

Target that’s not very easy to predict where the openings of the bag are going to be and the second is it’s a little bit conspicuous the more time the pickpocket or Thief takes it’s going to allow more time for somebody to notice them trying to get into your bag if it’s

A little bit more difficult they might not be as smooth or as stealthy and those are the things that are going to make the pickpocket just simply choose someone else now another another thing to note about the backpack wiggle is it doesn’t have to be a super exaggerated

Motion you don’t want to look like a weirdo it’s just a small little thing it’s just a small little thing so like if you’re on the Metro and it’s bouncing you’re just adding a different kind of Bounce in a different direction and that’s a little bit less predictable for

A pickpocket or a thief it changes your Rhythm compared to the rhythm of all the other people who are on the Metro or on the bus or in the park or walking around makes your Rhythm a little bit different and a little bit more tricky to steal by

Moving a little side by side you increase the space you take up ever so slightly and the difference between a few centimeters can move you out of a thief’s hand range bu you a few seconds and a pickpocket is likely to move on now the backpack wiggle works if it’s

Just one strap although two straps is always better or if you have the bag on your front you can hold it like this when you’re in the Metro or somewhere crowded and you can do a little bit of a slight wiggle especially if you see somebody’s hands a little bit

Uncomfortably close to your things just a little bit of a wiggle like this they’re going to think twice they’re going to just basically it’s going to be more difficult of a Target so this works whether the bag is on your front or the bag is kind of on your side or the

Bag is on your back you can add to the effectiveness of the backpack Wiggle by wearing your backpack on your front when you’re in crowded spaces and make sure that you have your backpack zipped up so the zippers meet high at the top higher up is closer to eyelines and harder for

A pickpocket to work with now something I like to do on the Metro or when when I’m out in sightseeing and I need to check Google Maps and I don’t you know maybe I need to do a quick map check is I like to lean up against the wall so

You can see that my backpack is leaning against the wall and that reduces the attack surface the attack vectors that somebody could get into my bag by doing this somebody can’t get into my bag from behind basically the only way somebody could approach me is within my

Peripheral vision so it’s just one more added way to protect the things in your backpack it’s just a little bit more you know you blend in a little bit more it’s a little bit easier it’s just going to make things a little bit more comfortable for you when you’re checking

Things on your phone for example or you want to take a break or you’re where it’s very very crowded it’s better to be up against the wall and not in this sea of people the backpack wiggle isn’t going to stop all thieves and isn’t a single solution to solve the problem of

Pickpocketing the backpack wiggle is part of your backpack security strategy a tool a tool in Your Arsenal to make you a less attractive Target to thieves remember you don’t have to outrun the lion just have to outrun the person next to you I hope this video is helpful for

You and I hope you incorporate the backpack wiggle into your backpack security strategy let me know if you have any questions down in the comments below and if you found this video useful make sure you hit the like And subscribe buttons I’ll have new videos for you

Every week and I will see you in the next video

Wiggle, wiggle, wiggle.
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