

Step 1: Be prepared

  • Carry a few extra passport sized photos in different bags. 

Oh wow that is a neat way of doing that. I wonder if <a href="http://juanlaw.com/immigration-lawyers" rel="nofollow">dallas immigration attorneys</a> do anything similar when consulted on similar problems. Thank you for the really interesting information.
Thanks so much for these tips! Do you know where I can find a <a href="http://immigration-lawyer-us.com" rel="nofollow">immigration lawyer in jacksonville fl</a>? Thanks!
I will definitely get <a href="http://www.insuranceexpress.ca/Travel.html" rel="nofollow">travel insurance in Calgary</a> after reading this. Thanks for sharing this.
Your article is extremely helpful for the travelers. It'll help them a great deal to avoid the tensions arise in case of passport theft or lost. <br> <br><a href="http://www.seabreezetravels.com/flights-to-luanda" rel="nofollow">Cheap Flights to Luanda</a>
Losing a passport could really ruin a trip. Doing research on how to replace a lost passport I found that there are services that can get you a passport replacement in one to two days. <br><br>Here is the one I used to replace my lost passport in 2 days. <br><br><a href="http://allpassport.com/lost-passport-stolen-passport/" rel="nofollow">Replace your passport online at ALLpassport.com</a>
Thanks for your post! <br><br>Last month two of my clients (Marianne Lee and Harry Fok, from Toronto, Canada) were robbed of their belongings, passports, cameras, money, accessories, etc.. she wanted me to pay for that but I only gave him the service of the tour. I have a tour operator called Go Panama! and all I could do was not to charge for the tour and help her translating her report and sent her to the police station. She thought I was an insurance agency! if you go on a trip please do not blame the travel agent or try to make them pay for your lost items. It is not even proof that she had that in her bag... great tip to take a picture and save all receipts.<br><br>The sad thing is that she wrote a review in tripadvisor saying that I didn't help her and didn't responde for her belongings...this was in Panama, at theNational Park: Chagres where natives provide a tour into their village (Embera), this 2 bandits came from the forest....how can I responde for something like that?<br><br>They had to renew their passports, almost 200.00 each! <br><br>Thanks for reading,<br><br>Natassha <br>Go Panama!
Hey great instructable! Thanks for the tips
Hi<br /> Excellent 'ible&nbsp;you wrote,&nbsp;Thanks!<br /> <br /> &lt;Q&gt;Some people are uncomfortable putting their real name online, posting their email address anywhere, or giving out their address.&nbsp; Obviously this suggestion won't work for those people.&nbsp; But it worked great for me.&nbsp; &lt;/Q&gt;<br /> <br /> I&nbsp;don't doubt it works great for you, it is a good idea, except it will also work out great for the lads in Lagos, Nigeria, too! You know, those 419 scammers, in fact more generally, any scammer / hacker the world over.<br /> <br /> Just note these things about the internet- <br /> <br /> -The internet is, of course,&nbsp;on all the time!<br /> -Sites&nbsp;(incl Google&nbsp;Docs) are&nbsp;being poked at by hackers&nbsp;for&nbsp;vulnerabilities&nbsp;all the time!<br /> -There are huge online communities and black markets peddling&nbsp;CC&nbsp;numbers, hacking techniques and findings, hacking&nbsp;services,&nbsp;Zombie botnets, VXers, the world over, all relatively&nbsp;untouchable.&nbsp;<br /> -Chances are that Google and everywhere else&nbsp;are being slowly punched away at 24 / 7 / 365 for random account access just for whatever goodies might be within. Its pretty much nearly free to set up and do,&nbsp;its weird to think it,&nbsp;but they'd be mad not to do it for the riches they could pull in!&nbsp;<br /> Time is on their side and its why you keep hearing about compromised personal information from sites that store it all the time. <br /> Its not just the criminals either, its opressive governments, just look in the news&nbsp;at the efforts of China punching away&nbsp;at (hacking)&nbsp;Google for quite some time now!<br /> <br /> And if you think nothing can be done with a pic of&nbsp;your Passport stored online, think again. Ever had a loan taken out under your name?&nbsp;Online banking makes it possible, esp with the info you propose people put online!&nbsp;<br /> You ever use&nbsp;a debit card in a shop?&nbsp;Of course you have,&nbsp;some companies are very lax when it&nbsp;comes to data retention&nbsp;and storage&nbsp;of your personal details - I&nbsp;had my debit card cancelled once, the bank only told me it was because the card # was found&nbsp;to have been in posession by criminals, I&nbsp;think it was to do with the highly publicised&nbsp;T K&nbsp;Maxx (TJ&nbsp;Maxx) million plus credit card rip off -&nbsp;I&nbsp;had used my card in there a few months prior to my card being cancelled, but I&nbsp;couldn't be sure it was this.<br /> <br /> TK&nbsp;Maxx are only&nbsp;at the pinnacle of the problem because they had a vast amount of CC#s stolen from their computer systems, across the internet. Its the biggest amount of&nbsp;numbers stolen to date.&nbsp;It is literally happening all the time, and if you don't follow the IT&nbsp;news, you wont see it.&nbsp;Some people I&nbsp;speak to even believe the situ is getting better, far from it because scammers are actually making real money from it, its a growing 'profession'.<br /> <br /> I&nbsp;work in IT, I keep up to speed on the real issues with internet security. I&nbsp;would NEVER store photographs of my Passport, store credit/debit card numbers, anything like that online ever and I&nbsp;would recommend to anybody that they dont do it. The more people do it, the better a reason for scammers / hackers to poke away at&nbsp;sites like Google Docs with more intensity.<br /> <br /> Think I'm being paranoid, check it out for yourself&nbsp;- just take a look at <a href="http://www.theregister.co.uk" rel="nofollow">www.theregister.co.uk</a> homepage right now, look at the internet and mobile security stories right now. Theres something on their about it every day, so it doesn't matter when you look! <br /> Heres one recently posted one I&nbsp;just found - <a href="http://www.theregister.co.uk/2010/01/12/bank_server_breached/" rel="nofollow">http://www.theregister.co.uk/2010/01/12/bank_server_breached/</a><br /> You would think banks would put the investment into making sure things like this dont happen!<br /> <br /> Sorry for being all negative, but I'm afraid its all&nbsp;factual. I'm sure other ways of protecting yourself if your docs are stolen when travelling would be preferable, maybe keeping such docs on your&nbsp;password protected smartphone, but I&nbsp;don' t know how much more secure this would be than Google Docs.<br /> <br /> Speaking of stuff like this, has anybody seen scammy type adverts pop up on their system, like - &quot;You're computer is vulnerable, click here to scan for viruses&quot;? I'm talking about on the&nbsp;Instructables site!&nbsp;I haven't seen it recently though I'd hope the admins have cleared it up by now.<br /> <br /> Have a nice one!<br />
Ahh I&nbsp;just thought!&nbsp;<br /> I&nbsp;suppose you could upload these things to Google Docs or cloud file-store sites, but PGP&nbsp;it up first (encrypt it).<br /> Does Google Docs allow you to upload encrypted files?<br /> Note - MS&nbsp;Office password protected files are NOT&nbsp;enough! ;-)<br />
I&nbsp;made sure to &quot;delete&quot; my files from the online storage after i returned.&nbsp; After all, i now have a new passport to scan and upload before my next trip...<br />
Deleting the data after the trip is&nbsp;a very good move, and recommended to everybody.<br /> As I&nbsp;said, the danger comes in your data being 'exposed' to possible theft over the internet for long periods of time, possibly&nbsp;between&nbsp;travelling (I&nbsp;don' t travel very often myself, maybe once a year at best).<br /> Am I right in saying that&nbsp;many nations password validity period is ten years?&nbsp;It is in the UK.<br />
<br /> In New Zealand it used to be every 10 years (every 5 years if you were a child, but the second application in that time was free).&nbsp; Now it is 5 yearly for everyone and the price increased from NZ$80 to NZ$150.&nbsp; A good money spinner for the govt.<br />
Many years ago as a college student who was going to spend a semester traveling in South America, I prepared to secure my passport by making very deep pockets in my jeans. &nbsp;I cut open the bottom of an existing pocket and added enough length to it that I could carry my passport and travelers checks low enough that I could comfortably bend at the hip to sit on a bus or a train for long stretches. &nbsp;The denim was thick enough that one didn't really notice the pocket. &nbsp;When my friends and I were held up in a remote national park near Santa Marta, Colombia, I walked away with all my things intact except for the small amount of &quot;mugger money&quot; I carried in my pocket. &nbsp;
Very wise.<br />
For U.S. Citizens, see<br> <br> WWW.TRAVEL.STATE.GOV<br> <br> It's the State Department/ Consular Affairs website (the guys that run all the legal officialness of U.S. Passports). There is a lot of info (all of the legally necessary info I would assume) about getting or replacing U.S. Passports and finding embassies, and a lot of other things.<br> <br> I'm sorry I don't know where to direct anyone outside of U.S. for their info, but I would imagine keeping your searches to official government sources will be most productive and keep the scam artists out of your pockets.<br> <br> Nice instructable. Good to have options for everyone's different comfort levels with various security issues.
This is why I always stash my passport in a security belt <br />
My Canadian passport was stolen in northern Mozambique in 2003 having a copy of it in another bag got me a police report in Moz, back across the border into Malawi and communicating with the High Commission in Zambia to get it replaced. <br /> <br /> It was a mission. I cannot reccomend strongly enough that a paper print out of your documents in another safe-ish spot in your bags is very handy. <br /> <br /> I hope that people in trouble get to this instructable if they google it from somewhere back of beyond. Thankfully, I had a partner who hadn't lost their passport with me when I lost mine. The feeling of being without it is hard to describe but very difficult to work through when you're in the midst of sorting out how to get through all the admin and work constructively with the administrators.<br /> <br /> Happy travels to all -- it's worth it!<br />
really good instructuable, thanks
I had to open a file I received last November that was created in an unknown program and up popped Google Docs.&nbsp; From memory, Google docs offers a warning that docs opened are available in Google memory banks (paraphrased).&nbsp; I've tried to recreate the scenario or find details in the help section but can't seem to find it.<br /> <br /> If you're uncomfortable posting the info to an email address, Google docs, etc., consider using a service like ifile.it.&nbsp; Other upload sites like rapidshare have time limits for files; they're deleted if not accessed within a certain amount of time.&nbsp; ifile.it doesn't delete files and there's no directory anywhere that lists the files they have (that I'm aware of).&nbsp; Save the passport info, cc info, etc. as files in a zipped file (with password, if you're really security conscious) or as a multi page pdf file.&nbsp; Put the link to your files in a safe place because if you lose that you won't access the info.<br /> <br /> Cheers,<br />
&nbsp;Taking a photo of my passport and emailing to myself (ie. putting it 'in the cloud') really helped when I lost my passport &nbsp;a few months ago. Definitely a good idea...
Invaluable information and some good tips there I'll be sure to follow if I go outside the EU (or even if I don't)<br />
If someone wanted to collaborate on a less American-centric tutorial I'd be happy to open this to them...<br />
&nbsp;My wife and I were burgled in Spain last year and lost both our UK passports which were in the same bag. &nbsp;I normally carry the small bag with me at all times but we were burgled and the bag was downstairs in the house.<br /> <br /> Here are my suggestions for UK people.<br /> <br /> Before travelling go to a photographer and have credit card sized images of the passport main page taken and laminated. &nbsp;Carry them in your wallets and keep one of each passport in your accomodation.<br /> <br /> Leave photocopies of passports with a friend or relative. Leave bank phone numbers and credit card company numbers (and card numbers) also in case of wallet loss.<br /> <br /> Dont leave your bag with passports cash, credit cards near the front door like I did!!!<br /> <br /> Keep a credit card separate from your other valuables. Keep a phone separate.<br /> <br /> Check embassy and consulates near your destination(s) and note their phone numbers and opening times.<br /> <br /> Do the things that are shown in this 'ible also.<br /> <br /> Don't be paranoid - be careful.<br />
And sometimes you can even rent them in the airport!<br />
&quot;Scan your passport and relevant visa pages and upload to a secure online storage site that you can access from any online computer.&nbsp; I&nbsp;used Google docs to store both pdf and jpg versions.&quot;<br /> <br /> Scan all your personal details and put them on the internet?<br /> I thought this was about security??<br />
Some people are uncomfortable putting their real name online, posting their email address anywhere, or giving out their address.&nbsp; Obviously this suggestion won't work for those people.&nbsp; But it worked great for me.&nbsp; The embassy staff were very happy to have a copy of my information.&nbsp; <br /> <br /> The way I see it, my information is more secure online than if i carry a photocopy of it in every bag on my trip.&nbsp; <br /> <br /> But I'm not overly concerned about identity theft.&nbsp; Heck, my passport is floating around out there somewhere right now.<br />
US passports are often desirable to thieves because nefarious types, like terrorists, can buy and use them to gain entrance to the US.&nbsp; A&nbsp;key precaution would be to keep valuable documents in a shoulder wallet worn inside one's shirt.&nbsp; People are often too careless with purses and backpacks.&nbsp; Thanks for making people aware.&nbsp; <br />
Didn't think one needed a US passport to get in, Nigerian ones seem to work pretty well!<br />
Ha! Yes :p The more infamous ones had no problems using their very own passport without a problem :p<br /> <br /> Passports are fairly useless to other people (except in movies :p).<br /> <br /> It's somewhat like your SS#... We're told to keep it under lock and key - but it's super easy (as in $25-$50) to find someone's by running a credit check. This is especially useful (for businesses) when independent contractors don't want to give up their info... There's a lot more than a SSN needed to do anything :p<br />
damn those terrorists.. damn those foreigners that wanna get in ^^<br />
We&nbsp;traveled through China 2 years ago and, before leaving,&nbsp;I purchased what looks like a fishermen's vest. It was festooned with pockets, both external and internal.<br /> <br /> The nicest feature was an internal zippered pocket where my Canadian passport fit nicely.<br /> <br /> Needless to say that vest never left my back in public. <br /> <br /> It was also handy for carrying my cash for the day, gum, camera, travel documents, etc...<br /> <br /> On the other hand, my wife relied on a passport pouch she wore under her shirt... where only I could get at it. (nudge, nudge, wink, wink)
Great info - thank you!<br />
in addition to keeping a photocopy of the passport (and anyrelevant Visas) in a different bag - I&nbsp;also usually leave a copy with a trusted person at home. That way if EVERYTHING gets lost/stolen you have an extra backup!<br />
That's one that i forgot on the list... Thank you.&nbsp; I&nbsp;added it.<br />
before you go, scan it to a file and email it to yourself. then you can pull it up on email in any internet cafe anywhere in the world<br />
Bound to be useful to someone, download the pdf to something and take-with?<br /> <br /> L<br />
Good lord, I think&nbsp;I'll just stick to looking at other people's pics online and staying in my home country.<br />
I know it reads like it's tempting, but don't ever put documents like passports in pdf&nbsp; or jpg format on any server. EVER. I don't care if it's rapidshare, hotfile, gmail, hotmail. Hell, I wouldn't care if it's your home server with a 17 digit random key 256 bit key. If you have to keep an electronic version of it, put it on a thumbdrive and carry it in your shoe. <br />
Not sure how you lost it, but when I travel I carry my passport with me in one of those highly annoying money belts on the inside of my pants at nearly all times. This cuts down on the risk of this happening. <br /> <br /> That said, if I were to lose it, this would be a great Instructable to go read. <br />

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