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Digital Lockout: A Cautionary Tale 

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AUTHOR: Mark Crothers on 10/17/2025

I recently flew to Spain to meet a friend who was coming from London. We enjoyed a few lovely days together until disaster struck. After spending an hour at the pool, my friend went to check his phone for the time—only to realize he’d forgotten to take his phone out of his swimming shorts pocket. By then, it was too late: the phone had slipped out and been sitting at the bottom of the pool the entire time.

Attempts to revive the device failed, so we drove to the nearest phone store to purchase a replacement. That’s when the problems compounded. Although his SIM card worked in the new phone, he couldn’t validate the verification emails from his cloud backup services—there was no way to prove his identity without access to his accounts.

The result? He was stuck in Spain with no access to his cash(all digital), return flight boarding documents, or phone contacts. As a self-employed contractor in the middle of signing up for a new contract, the potential loss of income and reputation couldn’t have been worse.

I’d never really considered this digital lockout scenario before, but watching my friend’s increasing agitation and frustration as he unsuccessfully tried to access his much-needed details brought it powerfully home. Thankfully, after a further day of frustration, a friend of mine had the phone number of one of his friends. After a whole lot of upheaval and further phone calls, a key holder gained access to his home laptop and could confirm the validation emails. In total: three days of worry and disruption…and three days of all drinks and food on me.

So what could my friend have done to avoid this nightmare?  Particularly when we’re traveling and perhaps already out of our comfort zone. The solution, to my mind, isn’t abandoning security measures, but building in redundancy before disaster strikes.

Keep a note in your wallet with critical phone numbers and flight details, old-fashioned perhaps, but paper doesn’t need validation emails. Carry a physical card for payments, screenshot your boarding passes and important documents, then email them to yourself for browser access. And consider giving a trusted contact back home access to essential information they could retrieve in an emergency.

The irony is that modern security protects us brilliantly from hackers but can lock us out just as effectively when things go wrong. I guess the question isn’t whether your password is strong enough—it’s whether you can prove you’re you when everything that proves it is under water.

 

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Winston Smith
1 day ago

Mark,

Another great, thought provoking article.

Thanks for posting it!

Linda Grady
2 days ago

Thanks for bringing up this topic, Mark. Dawn Gilbertson’s August 12, 2025 WSJ article also covered “Surviving the loss of your phone “ (sorry I couldn’t figure out how to copy a link). I’m thinking of buying a “burner phone “ to have as a backup during an upcoming overseas trip. I only need texting, email and camera, as I won’t be conducting any business. Any further advice is appreciated. Thanks in advance.

OldITGuy
2 days ago

Good article. My wife and I use each others phone & email as authorized alternate verification methods on our accounts. Also, since we travel with a laptop we always have at least 3 devices with us we can use if one of our devices is unavailable. Of course a single person wouldn’t have that spousal option. Even with all that, a paper backup as you suggested just seems like a good idea.

David Powell
2 days ago

Like James, we use an app that holds flight info with confirmation emails attached to the itinerary (ours is called Tripsy). We’d have to lose both phones to be in a pickle.

We also both use a password manager, keep a spare Yubikey for two factor authentication (2FA) on our keychains, and ensure our phones and 2FA Authenticator app are backed up to a secure cloud service.

All this means we can get back to 100% good to go, from a cold start with a brand new phone, in about an hour if we have zippy internet service.

mytimetotravel
2 days ago

I’m not sure I fully understand the problem (although I do understand the frustration). Why couldn’t he access his email on the new phone? I used to put local SIMs in my phones when I was traveling and I had no problem accessing email.

mytimetotravel
2 days ago
Reply to  Mark Crothers

Got it. I use Google as little as possible, although I do have a Google phone. I know the password for my email account, plus when I was traveling I had key passwords on a slip of paper I kept in my money belt. I also traveled with an iPad which I used for any financial transactions – with a VPN.

Linda Grady
2 days ago
Reply to  mytimetotravel

Thanks for this advice, Kathy.

David Powell
2 days ago
Reply to  mytimetotravel

Sounds like he was using email for 2FA and could not access email.
🥚🐓

James McGlynn CFA RICP®

I print up paper copies and bring with me but even better I use “Tripit” a travel app that has my itinerary with all the codes in there. But after reading this I will make sure to also add the pdf’s into “Tripit” as well. And as someone who wears glasses I always pack an old pair just in case!

Doug C
2 days ago

Another mechanism for secondary authentication (instead of email) is the use of a 2FA key stored on a physical device like a YubiKey.

Not all services support this type of 2FA mechanism so it may not have helped your friend in his particular case.

But what I do for all websites where it is enabled is store a 2FA identifier on a hardware device (which I carry with me on my key chain) as well as stored in a password manager that I can access on my phone or any web browser.

FYI, I use Bitwarden as my password manager after switching from Lastpass a couple of years ago as LastPass is known to have had some serious security breaches in the past.

Thus I store Passkeys for each website on a physical device, Bitwarden and also stored in Google, and therefore have multiple ways to prove my identity

Last edited 2 days ago by Doug C
David Mulligan
2 days ago

I use LastPass to store all my passwords, so I can log on from anywhere and connect to all my accounts.

Herbert
1 day ago
Reply to  David Mulligan

There has been lots of issues with Last Pass in the last couple of years including data breaches, transparency issues, damaged trust, etc. Lots of better options including Bitwarden, 1Passord, Proton Pass, etc.

Herbert
1 day ago
Reply to  Mark Crothers

You better make sure you remember the master password to your password manager. Also, if 2FA is enabled, you will need access to either you email or phone for verification.

As others suggested, you would need something else to verify yourself if you phone is gone: laptop, tablet, another phone.

It’s a long and tedious process but worthwhile and must do process.

Also: add “trusted” and trusted emergency contacts to your accounts.

Update all beneficiaries and add contingent beneficiaries.

David Powell
2 days ago
Reply to  Mark Crothers

Today, you have many choices. Apple, Google, and Microsoft have built free password managers into their operating systems/browsers. There are also a few good third-party ones.

Be sure to enable 2FA with any password manager you use, and choose a strong password or passphrase to access it. Once you have it set up, use a laptop or desktop with a web browser and the password manager to replace old passwords with new, longer, random ones.

Last edited 2 days ago by David Powell
AnthonyClan
1 day ago
Reply to  David Powell

A password manager with 2FA creates the original problem. The solution appears to have a second device available, i.e. iPhone+ a laptop or iPad. Kinda defeats the idea of travelling light, but the second devise solves a lot of potential problems.

DAN SMITH
2 days ago

Mark, thanks for this one. Your post reads like an episode of the Twilight Zone. I actually asked AI, how might Rod Serling describe losing your cell phone when on vacation. The answer was too long to paste here, but was spot on hilarious. I shared this one on my Facebook page.

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