Safety first

When you make a reservation, how does the travel industry store and then protect that data?

The answer: not very well.

Hackers can easily access all of your travel records, and that also includes your method of payment.

For decades, the travel industry—especially the airlines—relies on a six-digit record locator, often called a PNR, or Passenger Name Record.

Anyone with that locator number and the passenger’s last name can access everything.

Many airline sites do not limit the number of failed attempts to view reservation details.

What’s worse is that the airline reservation systems do not track logins.

Until the airlines beef up security, keep in mind how many people can easily access your information if they have your locator.

So keep that six-digit confirmation locator—that PNR—secret.

Don’t share it with anyone but the airline.

What does artificial intelligence have to do with your next hotel stay?

New technology in hotel bathrooms

A lot more than you might imagine.

At the Irvine Marriott Hotel in California, the company installed an Internet-connected mirror with the shower.

Why? The hotel company figured out that some of us come up with our best creative ideas in the shower.

When the steam fogs up the mirror, it creates a digital whiteboard on a section of the door that allows you to draw all over the glass with your fingers and then email your creations back to you.

There are also mobile powered room keys with a Facebook Messenger chatbot that lets you set your own wake-up calls and order room service.

If all this technology sounds cutting edge, I see one big problem—at least with the shower thought mirror.

I’m sure it’s helping to develop some great ideas. But it might be working too well. Let’s face it—some of us think more slowly than others.

Combine that with the shower experience, and I can’t wait for Marriott to get its water bill.