Going on Holiday to Egypt, Turkey, China or the Middle East?

It's Holiday time again - Don't be a target for Identity theft.

It's that time of year again when millions of us start preparing for our summer holidays -- confirming travel and hotel reservations, dusting off suitcases and looking for games to occupy the kids on long journey's. Just make sure that when your brain goes into holiday mode, you don't ignore the usual precautions you would take in everyday life to protect your personal information.

Here are a few safeguards to consider:

Thin out wallet. Don't carry too much information -- or cash -- in your wallet when traveling. Take two credit or debit cards, in case one inadvertently gets damaged or deactivated by the card issuer because of suspected fraud, but leave the rest at home. If you are traveling abroad, take a travel money card (choose one you can top-up online) instead of your credit/debit cards.

Carry your travel documents, health information and any insurance papers with you and keep copies of these along with copies of the contents of your wallet (and passport, if traveling abroad) and keep them in a secure, locked location, such as a hotel safe; also have copies stored on a secure online web service  that you can access from anywhere in the event your wallet or documents are lost or stolen.

Card precautions. The only consistent advice from all financial institutions seems to be that customers should make sure that they have registered up-to-date mobile phone contact details, so contact can be made immediately should a problem be flagged. Banks, building societies and credit card firms do usually try to ring a customer when they become suspicious about a transaction, so if they have your correct details it can smooth everything out straight away. It helps too to make a note of your bank’s 24-hour contact numbers to get in touch immediately that any difficulties arise. I also program these phone numbers into my mobile phone for quick access.

Beware of card skimming, where dishonest restaurant or store employees use a portable card reader to copy information from your credit or debit card's magnetic strip. Also avoid using unusual looking ATMs because they could have an altered card slot and hidden cameras that can be used to steal your account information and password.

Internet precautions. Whenever logging onto the Internet on your laptop, tablet or smartphone at a Wi-Fi hotspot, hotel business center or other public facility, be extra cautious before doing any online banking or updating of other password-protected services such as Facebook, twitter etc. (See this post)

Ideally once you have connected to the WiFi Hotspot, switch on your device's VPN before you visit any websites to ensure that nobody is able to harvest your usernames and passwords, read the emails you send back home to family and friends or see the updates you make to social networks. 


Your device's VPN is also ideal for gaining access to blocked services such as Skype, Facebook, catchup TV,  and other services in countries where they are banned (Egypt, Middle East, China, Turkey and many more) and also on public WiFi hotspots which  might restrict access to these services. You can signup to the TravelVPN service from TheVPNStore.com here.


Finally...

Keep your itinery private. A few years ago, police warned against sharing too much information about your holiday plans, for fear burglers would target empty homes. Nowadays, many people think nothing of sharing their holiday plans on social networking sites or in outgoing phone or email messages.

You might only be sharing your plans with a few friends, but how do you know they won't inadvertently pass that information to someone you don't know? Plus, no matter how carefully you shield your plans, your kids might have no such reservations with their online friends. Consider making a family rule that no holiday plans or photos get posted online until you're safely home again.