Ever wondered what is on your Thai hotel magnetic key card?

Ever wondered what is on your hotel magnetic key card??┬а
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!?┬а?When you turn them in 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.
?Simply put, hotels do not erase the information on these cards until an employee re-issues 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. 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!?
Recommendations;
?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 in to the front desk when you check out of a room. They will not charge you for the card (it's illegal - in UK) 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 scanning device card reader.
?For the same reason, if you arrive at the airport and discover you still have the card key in your pocket, do not toss it in an airport trash basket. Take it home and destroy it by cutting it up, especially through the electronic information strip! You can also use a small magnet and pass it across the magnetic strip several times. Then try it in the door, if it does not work it erases everything on the card.?
Information courtesy of: Kent Police

... for this latest set of urban myths (in many cases) - and why does it relate to Thailand?

Oh harsh Homintern, I think you may well be right that it is an Urban myth. I changed the title to make it Thai relevant and make you happy in that regard.

I did a google and found several reports that it is an urban myth, including this one from the LA Times

"Hotel cards: Holding ID key?
Credit and other data are not accessible on the plastic that opens room doors.
May 7, 2006

HERE'S an urban myth that refuses to die: Hotel card keys are gold mines for identity thieves, who extract credit card numbers and other personal nuggets from them. This rumor, generating millions of Internet postings in recent years, is based on a thin premise at best. Now it's been convincingly debunked by Computerworld, a Framingham, Mass.-based weekly trade tabloid for information technology professionals. The publication challenged a top maker of magnetic card readers to find personal data on 100 room-card keys тАФ from Hilton, Holiday Inn, Sheraton, Westin and other major chains тАФ collected by staff members in their travels. The result? Nada.

Even when scrutinized by a scanner the size of a stove top, the cards yielded only indecipherable strings of numbers and letters, said Terry Benson, engineering group leader for MagTek Inc. in Carson, who did the tests. Card-key systems at hotels do keep secrets. They can monitor the comings and goings of staff, bill guests for restaurant meals and spa treatments, operate slot machines in casinos and more.

And in the future, you may be able to open your room door remotely, perhaps by waving a card or pointing your Bluetooth-enabled cellphone at it. At the front desk, a clerk you've never met may greet you by name, gleaning your identity тАФ and room preferences тАФ from a wireless pickup of biometric data. All this technology is being perfected; indeed, some of it already is in place at a few sites.

For now, the basic magnetic-stripe card reigns as the king of room keys, used by most of the hotel industry, said Brian Garavuso, chairman of the technology committee for the American Hotel & Lodging Assn. in Washington, D.C. The cards are popular because they are cheap, Garavuso said, so there's little incentive to find a substitute. "We assume all the guests are going to walk off with them," said Thomas Spitler, vice president of front-office operations and systems for Hilton Hotels Corp. in Beverly Hills. "If we get them back, it's a bonus for us."

Birth of a rumor - AND what happens if someone walks off with your card key? That question has spun a web of anxiety that may stretch back to 2003, according to the Pasadena Police Department. That fall, officials said, a Pasadena detective at a seminar was told that another agency's investigators had found names, addresses and credit card numbers on hotel card keys. She alerted other detectives to the possible danger, causing a chain reaction of rumor.

Later investigation showed that such personal data were not coming from hotels, but possibly from crooks who loaded information onto the cards, said Janet Pope Givens, spokeswoman for the Pasadena Police. What happened next testifies to the power of the Internet: The identity-theft rumor raced around the globe. "For two weeks straight," Pope Givens recalled, "we did nothing but answer calls about key cards worldwide." In response, the department posted an explanation on its website. (It's still there). The furor died down, but Pope Givens says she still fields calls in spurts."

... does not make it any more relevant to Thailand and in fact makes it more misleading, as you're suggesting that (if it's true, which it's not) it applies only to Thailand. As far as I recall you are the same person who runs around screaming "the sky is falling, the sky is falling" while repeating some spurious Internet virus myth warning you've picked up from a trawl through the Internet or one of your misguided correspondents has sent you

homintern is still drunk, he can't even find the front door never mind realising he is on the "global" forum. These threads do not have to be Thai related.

[Aunty]

homintern is still drunk, he can't even find the front door never mind realising he is on the "global" forum. These threads do not have to be Thai related.


BWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA. I think Beryl's always on the booze, Cedric.

... but have you two spring chickens thought of having your eyes tested. Here's an excerpt from the Thailand Forum, where this thread began

http://upload7.postimage.org/112951/moved.jpg (http://upload7.postimage.org/112951/photo_hosting.html)

Doubtless there will now be some jejune post from either (or both) of you crowing about how I've been suckered in. The phrase "BWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA" springs immediately to mind as something along those lines from my niece with Tourette Syndrome, Aunty

Hey, Homi...why did you take the photo down from your gaydar profile page? I've already saved it to my hard disk, you yutz! BWAHAHAHA!

Ever wondered what is on your hotel magnetic key card??┬а


wowpow, we know that Cheltenham is one of the most boring places on earth but surely you could find something other than copy & pasting stupid urban myths to amuse yourself.

I think his face has been lifted so much that it's squeezing what few brain cells haven't been addled by steroids.

Hey, Homi...why did you take the photo down from your gaydar profile page? I've already saved it to my hard disk, you yutz! BWAHAHAHA!Now that does seem to be jejune, to use the Colonel's phrase. Is boygeenyus stalking the Colonel?

[Aunty]

Hey, Homi...why did you take the photo down from your gaydar profile page? I've already saved it to my hard disk, you yutz! BWAHAHAHA!Now that does seem to be jejune, to use the Colonel's phrase. Is boygeenyus stalking the Colonel?

More likely that Curious is another of Beryl's many handles that he uses to infest this board with.

Colonel = Hovelturd = Miss Sybil Twit = Curious

What a sad sad man. Are there good Psychiatric Services in BKK, Boygeenyus, that you could put him in contact with?

[Lunchtime O'Booze]

and try to use them after i leave they are liable to get arrested. I believe there are warrants out for me in several countries..could solve a few problems.

More likely that Curious is another of Beryl's many handles that he uses to infest this board with.Disclaimer: Aunty Tourette is merely my niece, not another posting handle

Is boygeenyus stalking the Colonel?

You bet your sweet ass I am!

[Aunty]

Is boygeenyus stalking the Colonel?

You bet your sweet ass I am!

Why don't you do the board a favour, darling, and post his picture here? Failing that, why don't you send it to me. I'm sure I could find numerous uses for it.

Why don't you do the board a favour, darling, and post his picture here? Failing that, why don't you send it to me. I'm sure I could find numerous uses for it.Now, now - haven't you still got the family photo album your mother kept? Or did the Under Footman destroy that as well?