How do professional thieves act: “pinchers”, “burglars” and their other brothers in the criminal trade? How great is the risk and what kind of income does criminal activity provide? How to organize a crime and not get caught? How do thieves-officials act, whose income from fraud is many times greater in terms of the volume of loot than the thieves' efforts of their criminal brothers? What contributed to the emergence in society of lumpen people who steal everything they can get their hands on, and of a state elite that considers all the country’s property to be their property? The former gave birth to a powerful criminal community, and the latter - the ruling clan of thieves. Why are the former caught and imprisoned, while the latter are not even prosecuted? How to protect yourself and society from criminal activities of both the former and the latter? The author talks about this in a book designed for a wide range of readers.