How to Find Free Books from the Library BlackHat Tricks

Library books are often tagged with a thin metallic strip, typically found either betwixt the book's original spine and library's cover (see the accompanying images), or glued alongside the pages on the inside of the book, in the margins. In case of the former, jam a pen or a small Xacto knife into the gap between the covers, and pry the strip loose. 

It'll take you a couple minutes to get the strip out of there—a set of pliers or, better yet, tweezers will also be of great help to you in this endeavor. If, however, the strip is inside the book between the pages, chances are you'll have to cut out the page that the strip is attached to at the spine, and then after cutting out the strip from the page, tape the page back in.

Here's some eye candy outlining the aforementioned defanging process of removing the security strip from library books:

Figure 1. Your everyday, run of the mill library book, complete with the standard library binding glued over the book's own cover.

Figure 2. Here you can see the metallic EAS (Electronic Article Surveillance) strip between the covers. As described above, use a pen, Xacto knife blade, pliers, or tweezers to detach it.

Figure 3. And here is the security strip, post processing. It lies naked, defeated. The book is now free.

To locate the strip, hold a book up to the light and pear into the gap between the cover, you should see a small, slightly reflective strip. Alternatively, if the strip is between the pages on the inside, look at the edge of the book and you should see that one page seems to stick out slightly. That or simply flip through the book and look for the strip. If you feel that you've thoroughly glanced over the book and still can't find the strip, guess what, the book just might not be tagged. Not all library books are, just like neither are all of the products in stores.

If you don't feel like putzing around with all of this defanging business, consider simply tossing the desired book out of the library window and then retrieving it outside. If the book is particularly fragile, wrap it in bubble wrap and/or a towel, and use some tape to seal the deal.

Oh, and the library book may also have a barcode sticker on it for cataloguing purposes. The barcode/sticker won't set off the alarm by itself (that is, unless it's got an RF tag on its back, see Figure 4 in the following section, though that's uncommon for library books), but you should peel that shit off nonetheless. Fuck barcodes.