Cityside Locksmith feels it is important that anyone looking to hire a locksmith should be informed about the unfortunate reality that there are scammer companies to avoid. This is a long video, so below please find our summary of the important points:

• Scam type operations are heavily advertised and their listings are known to outnumber legitimate ads 100:1! It can make finding a legitimate company like searching for a needle in a haystack.
  
• Scam companies have very deep pockets and operate nationwide, overcharging by a lot. It is very difficult for a legitimate locksmith company to compete.
  
• The scam type companies will do anything to get you to call them. Their websites will often mislead you to believe that the service will be very inexpensive, advertising service calls or $15, and labor as $35 and up.
• Scam dispatchers will be unable to answer locksmith related questions or to give a flat rate price, or even a ballpark price. They will instead attempt to commit you to the service by rushing off the phone and dispatching a scammer technician, often lying and saying a technician will arrive 15 minutes.
• Scam technicians are taught to lie and deceive in order to charge high prices. They are dishonest and will force you into unnecessary services and paying too much.
  

At Cityside Locksmith, we are committed to operating a business with high morals. We care about our customers and would be happy to serve you!

We don’t really think about them too much, but keys are a part of our daily lives. Not only physical keys, but also the idea of needing a secure way to unlock something that is important to us. We need keys to access things like our home and cars, but even with possessions like our phone and laptops. You need a password, a key in a sense, to get into your devices. The concept of the key has definitely evolved over time, but where did it initially get its start?

6,000 Years Ago: Keys were first seen at the same time locks appeared, which was in ancient Babylon and Egypt. The small wooden devices used small pins, and a wooden toothbrush-shaped key would be used to lift those small pins and unlock the bolt. Unfortunately wood was not the best material, considering that it was not only bulky and heavy, but also easily broken.

700 BC: The next major evolution of the key came in Ancient Rome, where inventors were able to make major leaps and bounds upon the design of the wooden lock. Wood as a material was thrown to the wayside, replaced with iron and bronze, which allowed for stronger and smaller locks, as well as lighter keys.

Aside from materials, another drastic change was the shape of the key. It went from a flat structure with pins on the end to what we would call a skeleton key today., a cylindrical shaft with a rectangular bit at the end. This design continued to be used for 17 centuries after the fall of the Roman Empire.

1800’s: Linus Yale introduced modern flat keys in the 1800s, using a more sophisticated way of regulating the pins, which allowed the design of the key to change drastically. The flat keys were easy to manufacture, and with the invention of key cutting, they could be duplicated quickly.

Today: We continue to use flat keys today, although the process and mechanisms have become sleeker and provide greater security. Keys with magnetic signatures have also come into play, but are mostly used in hotels and office buildings. As mentioned before, passwords and thumbprint recognition can also be seen as evolutions of the key.

Keys have changed drastically over time, but the one thing that remains the same is their purpose. They are used to keep what we deem important safe, and that will never change. Here at Cityside Locksmith, we are just continuing to keep that history alive and well.

Source: http://www.historyofkeys.com/keys-history/history-of-keys/