[Nfbf-l] Hotel Room Keys Are A Security Leak
Judith Hamilton
jrhamilton51 at earthlink.net
Fri Nov 12 23:11:40 UTC 2010
Just my humble opinion, but folks who travel a lot and stay at hotels might
take a little time to advocate to the hotel management about the validity
of this article. If this information is true, and I am not saying it is or
is not, this might be a way of fostering better customer communication to
find a better way of doing business. Lots of fear factors come across
the Internet and just tolerating them, does nothing to improve the
situation. Maybe we need to be asking if we can take the key cards with us
when checking out and see what they say. Maybe the hotels might want to
have magnets or cell phones (i.e.: active cell phones used to invalidate a
hotel key card if put near the phone) available to swipe over the strip
prior to guest check out, so they won't have to keep spending money on
plastic cards, which we all know will be passed on to the consumer.
Regards,
Judy
> [Original Message]
> From: <MisterAdvocate at aol.com>
> To: <nfbf-l at nfbnet.org>; <nfbf-leaders at yahoogroups.com>
> Date: 11/12/2010 9:57:25 AM
> Subject: [Nfbf-l] Hotel Room Keys Are A Security Leak
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> Subject: FW: Good info..
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> Always take a small magnet on your holiday, it'll come in handy at the
> end of it!!
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> This is good info. Never thought about key cards containing anything
> other than an access code for the room! Read on......
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> HOTEL KEY CARDS
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> Know what's on your magnetic key card?
>
> Answer:
> a. Customer's name
> B. Customer's partial home address
> c. Hotel room number
> d. Check-in date and out dates
> e. Customer's credit card number and expiration date!
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> When you return it to the front desk your personal information is there
> for any employee to access by simply scanning the card in the hotel
> scanner.. An employee can take a hand full of cards home and using a
scanning
> device, access the information onto a laptop computer and go shopping
at your
> expense.
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> Simply put, hotels do not erase the information on these cards until an
> employee reissues the card to the next hotel guest. At that time, the
new
> guest's information is electronically 'overwritten' on the card and the
> previous guest's information is erased in the overwriting process.
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> But until the card is rewritten for the next guest, it usually is kept
in
> a drawer at the front desk with YOUR INFORMATION ON IT!
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> The bottom line is: Keep the cards, take them home with you, or destroy
> them. NEVER leave them behind in the room or room wastebasket, and
NEVER
> turn them into the front desk when you check out of a room. They will
not
> charge you for the card (it's illegal) and you'll be sure you are not
leaving
> a lot of valuable personal information on it that could be easily lifted
> off with any simple card scanning/reader device ..
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> For the same reason, if you arrive at the airport and discover you
still
> have the card key in your pocket, don't toss it in an airport bin; take
it
> home and destroy it by cutting it up, especially through the electronic
> information strip!
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> Alternatively if you have a small magnet, pass it across the magnetic
> strip several times when you leave your room for the last time before
checking
> out; now try it in the door, it should not work. It erases everything
on
> the card.
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> Information courtesy of: Metropolitan Police Service.
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> PLEASE FORWARD to friends and family
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