JEDDAH, 3 September 2005 — In an increasingly high-tech world, many people fear identity theft in which credit card or bank information is misappropriated and then misused by the thief.

When Arab News investigated this issue, most persons interviewed were concerned about hotel key cards, camera phones and Internet purchasing. Although some fears may be unfounded, others appear to be worthy of concern.

Recently, a guest at a Jeddah hotel lost his hotel key card. He was worried by foreign press reports that key cards may contain personal information, such as full names, credit card numbers, check-in and check out dates.

The man, whose key card was stolen, knew that these key cards are not reprogrammed until a new guest arrives and then new information is merely added to the key cards.

This means that if a lost card ends up in the wrong hands someone could extract the encoded information by scanning the card. He said he keeps the keycard upon checkout to safeguard the information.

However, when Arab News contacted area hostellers, we found none encoding credit information on the key card.

Erik Weinmann, sales and marketing director for Inter.Continental Hotels in Jeddah, said that they only enter room numbers in the key cards and that he didn’t know of any hotels that encode credit card numbers on the cards. He had no problem with guests keeping the key cards.

“If our guests want to keep the key cards as a souvenir of their stay in our hotel, it only makes us happy,” he said.

Omar Abolhana, a receptionist at the Jeddah Westin Hotel, confirmed that they only enter full names, room numbers, check-in and check-out dates.

He said that this information might last in the card memory for a couple of weeks but no longer than that. The cards are activated to work between the check in and check out dates only.

Although Omar assured that guests are not charged for taking their hotel key cards, a representative from Le Meridien Hotel took another view. He did not know why anyone would want to take the key cards and said those who did would be charged.

Mobile camera phones make some people worry. “It’s not just that someone could take a picture of me,” said Majid Mofti, a 35-year-old Jeddah resident. “I also worry about using my credit cards in stores and the supermarkets. I always make sure that nobody is standing next to me with a camera mobile,” he said.

Mofti reasons that someone could take a picture of his credit card with his name, card number and its expiration date and then steal his money. “People must watch out,” he said.

Internet purchasing appears to be a matter for genuine concern. Hussam Ragaban, who was studying in the United States, had to deal with one of these unfortunate situations when his credit card numbers were stolen via the Internet.

“When my credit card bill came, I found that I had been charged for hotels and restaurants in Turkey,” Ragaban said. “I’ve never been there!” He later discovered that his credit-card number had been stolen by a hacker when he was making an online purchase.

Arab News surveyed a cross section of people aged 20-50 regarding their fears of electronic identity theft.

The older respondents said we must be attentive and always check our personal belongings to eliminate chances of being hacked or robbed. The younger respondents had a different point of view. They said that if we worry about every bit and piece we will go crazy.

“We can’t be paranoid about everything that may befall us,” said Maysa Hussain, a woman grad student at King Abdul Aziz University. “Life is too short to be spent worrying.”

Young or old, worried or not, electronic identity theft appears to be a matter of genuine concern — at least in some cases. What you decide to do about it is up to you.