computerworld.com — What's scary is how easy it is for even a novice to steal this information. He says he bought a $39 card reader at a local retail store and plugged it into his laptop's USB port. Now when he scans a card, the device inputs the data directly into an open Excel or Word document.
Sep 20, 2005 View in Crawl 4
tpimentalSep 20, 2005Submitter
Snopes says this isn't true, but this CW blog has a specific example of it happening...<a class="user" href="http://www.snopes.com/crime/warnings/hotelkey.asp">http://www.snopes.com/crime/warnings/hotelkey.asp</a>
celebSep 20, 2005
I have tons of hotel cards laying around at my house. I will check them this week..
freetronSep 20, 2005
Digg is starting to look like f4rk :-|
zbeastSep 20, 2005
Who cares, if the information is there and it's stolen. The bank has to cover the loss not you.
adamgoldbergSep 20, 2005
<a class="user" href="http://www.snopes.com/crime/warnings/hotelkey.asp">http://www.snopes.com/crime/warnings/hotelkey.asp</a>
smergsSep 20, 2005
This is true. Not that my word means anything or anyone would care what I say but my girlfriend's dad is in the FBI and was telling us about this a few months back. It is true and can happen!!!
logostSep 20, 2005
Yeah... it can but not all. I currently work in one... heck im at work but he key card machine we currently have you have to type the room number yourself. Its not connect to the computer in any way dam its not even connected just powered... so yes but depends....
Closed AccountSep 20, 2005
scary if true - good find
doctechnicalSep 21, 2005
"#1 Yes your personal information CAN be stored on your room key."I suppose you could cram a verse or two from Poe's "The Raven" on there as well, but in either circumstance the obvious question would be "Why"?What advantage is it to the hotel to have an information other than room #/lock combo/date range on the keycard? If the keycard is going to be used to bill things to the room, that's all the info you'd need (tieing it back to a relational database). "FYI: Check out the bar code on the back of your driver's license. It contains all your personal information too. :)"Mine doesn't have a barcode, but it does have a mag-stripe. However in this circumstance it makes sense, as the license is supposed to be, in and of itself, a form of identification. A door key, on the other hand, is supposed to open the door ;)
makenzieNov 1, 2005
Iam a front desk clerk at hotel. The first thing you have to remember about this is that most of the time when you check out your key card is taken and tossed into a box with a bunch of other key cards. Secondly I don't know how many times I have had to re-key someones card because they have had it in a wallet or to close to a magnet. The key cards won't hold the information for very long if they do have your information encoded on them. When you check out most key card systems will void the card until the next time it gets used (by the next guest. But I guess if your really paranoid you can ask the desk clerk to re-key your key card while you watch as you check out.