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How to Protect Your Personal Data While You Travel

by Will Safer on June 2, 2008 at 06:21 PM



Add one more concern to travel safety: information security.

Your personal and work information is at risk every time you travel, according to experts, who say what you carry on your laptop can easily fall into the hands of nosey authorities at airports, especially in foreign lands. Also, Internet connections in hotels are sometimes not secure, so confidential work or personal messages can be compromised, even if you follow the typical security practices you'd use at home.

What's the answer to this leaky problem? Encrypt everything, or don't travel with your information at all. For business travelers, especially, this can be a tough rule to follow, since catching up on e-mail during a flight is sometimes the only time an executive has to clear out an overloaded inbox.

Even top government officials aren't immune. Chinese officials allegedly secretly copied the contents of a government laptop during Commerce Secretary Carlos M. Gutierrez's visit there. Here's the advice: if you're traveling with a Windows Vista machine, use Bitlocker to encrypt your whole hard drive. But remember, if you don't lock the computer every time you stop working, all your data will be accessible.

Sending and receiving data is also vulnerable, so make sure to encrypt any data streams you use. For file transfers, use a secure virtual private network, or VPN, connection, and for e-mail, use a secure sockets layer, or SSL, to protect yourself.

Some companies have their executives travel with laptops that have been completely wiped of all valuable data. They work exclusively "online" while overseas, getting what they need via e-mail and wiping it clean before traveling again. This can take a big bite out of productivity, though, if a secure connection isn't available.

The most secure way to travel? Don't bring a laptop at all. [Source: Newsvine]


Tags: laptop, security, summeradvice, travel

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