The holidays are a time for joy, family reunions, and adventures—but the increase in travel also opens a window of opportunity for identity fraudsters. With packed airports, rental cars, hotel bookings, public Wi-Fi, and distracted checking in, criminals are working overtime. Given the surge in travel this season, being proactive with your identity protection is more important than ever.
Why Travel Means Elevated Risk
When you’re on the move, you’re juggling more: bookings, rentals, checkpoints, maybe even international trips. It’s easy for small oversights to cost big. All of us need to be vigilant when booking and organizing travel plans because holiday scams spike this time of year and often involve fake rental offers or too-good-to-be-true deals. Exposed documents, unsecured Wi-Fi, and phony offers all contribute to the risk of identity theft.
What Identity Thieves Are Targeting This Season
Here are some of the common fraud vectors during holiday travel:
- Fake travel rental or site booking offers: If an online vacation-rental listing or flight deal seems unbelievably cheap and asks you to pay outside trusted platforms, treat it as a red flag.
- Public Wi-Fi & device exposure: Airport lounges, hotels, diners—all have Wi-Fi. But public networks can be traps: hackers can intercept your data or infect your device.
- Oversharing travel documents or posting them online: Boarding passes, passports, or hotel check-ins may carry more personal information than you realize, which criminals can use for identity fraud.
- Unsecured payment or rental check-ins: Using a debit card or registering your documents at a rental car kiosk without verifying the operator’s security can be risky.
Smart Steps to Travel Safer & Guard Your Identity
Here’s how you can stay one step ahead:
- Book through known, reputable channels. Whether it’s flight, hotel, or rental car, use companies you trust, double-check URL security, verify listings, and avoid wire transfers or unusual payment methods.
- Alert your bank and monitor accounts. Let your credit/debit card provider know you’ll be traveling. That way, genuine transactions aren’t flagged as suspicious—and you’ll spot anything odd quicker.
- Use credit cards (rather than debit) and secure payments. Credit cards often offer stronger fraud protections. If something goes wrong, you have a buffer.
- Avoid public Wi-Fi for sensitive activity. If you must use it, consider a VPN, or wait to check your bank until you have a trusted connection.
- Protect travel documents and minimize digital sharing. Don’t post boarding passes, rental confirmations, passport photos, or hotel check-in pictures on social media—store copies in secure, encrypted formats. Make sure physical documents are safe.
- Have a restoration plan in place in case something goes wrong. If your identity is compromised while you’re away, quick action matters. Know who to call and how to recover your accounts.
By applying these travel-specific precautions steps now, you’ll reduce your chances of becoming a target and ensure that your journey remains about the memories you’re making, not the damage control you’ll have to run later.
LibertyID Identity Theft Solutions for Individuals, Couples, and Families* provides its subscribers with 360° fully managed identity fraud concierge restoration services. We are experts in resolving all common forms of identity fraud. Our subscribers can also enroll in our Proactive Detection, which monitors and sends alerts when their SSN, Address, Dark Web, criminal record, and credit reports change.
*LibertyID defines an extended family as you, your spouse/partner, your parents and parents-in-law, and your children under the age of 25.