The key bypass is only on the cheapest consumer safes. Many of those can be opened just by rapping with a hammer. This vuln was found in Sargent & Greenleaf lo

The key bypass is only on the cheapest consumer safes. Many of those can be opened just by rapping with a hammer. This vuln was found in Sargent & Greenleaf locks. These are UL-listed locks suitable for securing cash in commercial establishments. They have no key bypass. These locks have the batteries outside the safe, so there is no dead battery issue. However, this enables easy current measurements, as the hacker showed. FYI, at this level there are no "electronic safes" - just regular safes with electronic locks, which have the same form factor as mechanical safe locks. Why an electronic lock? Much faster to enter the combo, proof against robo-dialers, can maintain an audit trail of multiple employees, can issue different combinations to different employees and revoke access.