Safe travels
By Dr. Selim Erhan, TLT Editor | TLT From the Editor June 2023
When traveling, we should think about the safety of our belongings.
We are in a very busy conference period and moving into summer. School years are ending, and vacation trips are being planned or started. It is a wonderful time because we can travel with our loved ones, go visit friends and family or go to a quiet part of the world away from everything—a vacation we have been looking forward to for a long time! Most of us have had a few conferences to attend, and just as we were catching up with notes, follow-ups and expense reports, it was time for our next conference. So, by the time we make it to our vacation, we pass through an intense period.
As we relax and go to our vacation mode, we need to be aware of issues that could arise. I read that most accidents happen within 10 miles of our home. So, when we relax, we tend to drop our guard and may forget essential items for our vacation. If we forget to bring a toothbrush, it is not so bad, but forgetting a passport would be disastrous. I am sure we all have had some unpleasant events like this at some time. The bad part is we do forget and can have unpleasant events occur again.
Recently my wife joined me at the end of one of my business trips. She left work and took a late flight on Friday. We had a nice dinner and a good rest. The next day was relaxing for both of us. We were invited to a friend’s birthday party that evening but had some free time before. We visited some sights in the city and later stopped at a mall to look for an item, which turned into a few hours. Finally, it was time to go. As we sat in our car and I was programming the address on my phone, I saw her getting steadily more frantic while searching inside her bag. Her phone was not there! We ran back in and started a desperate search but to no avail. No one had turned it in. The phone was turned off because we could not call. After the initial panic subsided, we started thinking as people do in the height of a problem, and she remembered she had left it in the restroom. It was not there, either. That meant someone had taken it, turned it off and was now looking to see if they could break into it. As we were looking at each other, we started remembering that all her passwords were on the phone—she did all her banking on her phone. We take pictures of our credit cards, front and back, in case our wallets are lost. Pictures of IDs, passports, etc.—all were on that phone!
She then called her son who she thought knew some of her passwords so we could freeze her accounts. He did not have the passwords, either, but he somehow managed to have a message put on the phone saying it was lost and was tracked. That helped, and as we tried calling the phone again, this time someone answered. They were sorry that their daughter had taken the phone and did not know what to do with it. She had brought it home. Of course, by this time, we were already at our friend’s house, and we were holed upstairs while the party was going in full swing downstairs. Luckily, they said we could come and pick it up. It was one of the happiest drives I ever had. But the moral of the story was that we realized we had no backup plans and no real emergency plans if something like this happened. We were very lucky to get the phone back. Weight was lifted off our shoulders, which was all good, but the worst-case scenarios are still with us.
We always talk about safety at work and safety working with tools, chemicals and equipment. We also should think about the safety of our belongings, critical papers, deeds, passwords, etc. Earthquakes, hurricanes, tornadoes, floods and fires can, in a few minutes, make us a nobody if we lose our ID, birth certificate, deeds or important documents. Do we have these in fire safe boxes or safety deposit boxes? Are those files that are carefully organized on our computers backed up? A lot of people have critical information stored in the cloud. I can joke and say clouds drift away, but the problem is serious. I just heard a program on public radio where a professional hacker, who is hired by companies to protect their computer systems, was saying that nowadays, hackers prefer trying to hack into cloud storage. Unlike individual computers, these clouds hold thousands of accounts—much more attractive targets! Accounts can be accessible from your step counter, your music video connections and other similar things because they are all connected to the cloud. Is it really necessary to store extremely critical information in the cloud? As they say, “An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.” Safe travels, everyone!
Dr. Selim Erhan is director of business development for Process Oils Inc. in Trout Valley, Ill. You can reach him at serhan@processoilsinc.com.