Ronald McDonald: Spraying people with his DNA. (Image by M.Minderhoud.)

The New York Times’ John Tagliabue has filed an interesting article about McDonald’s high-tech attempts at crime prevention at one of their Rotterdam restaurants. It involves employees activating an alarm that sprays criminals with DNA and alerts police that a crime is in progress. (Thanks to Gizmodo.) An excerpt:

“At this McDonald’s the DNA liquid is contained in an orange box the size of a large paperback book, mounted over an entrance door. ‘You don’t smell it; you don’t see it; nobody knows it’s there,’ said Jean-Paul Fafie, who has managed the McDonald’s for the last 12 years.

The system and the all-important warning sign seem to have successfully warded off any potential robbers. But there were kinks to be worked out.

‘In the beginning, it went off many times, even when there was no robbery,’ Mr. Fafie said. ‘And the police came every time.’

The false alarms were caused by employees who forgot, or never knew, about the protocol for secretly activating the system — removing a 10 euro bill from a special bill clip kept behind the counter.

‘We didn’t train our counter people properly,’ Mr. Fafie said sheepishly. As for a potential thief, he said, “we hope he’ll think twice before coming in.’”