Tips for Avoiding Tourist Scams and Cons
July 30, 2004 -- Bob Arno and his wife, Bambi Vincent, are expert travelers who've learned all the tricks of con artists and pickpockets in their travels around the world. In their new book: Travel Advisory! How to Avoid Thefts, Cons, and Street Scams While Traveling, they tell you how you can make it through a vacation without becoming a victim. Here are 10 of their tips:
1. Do your homework Travelers become victims for two reasons: They are inexperienced with the cons, scams and theft techniques used in foreign destinations and their awareness level is therefore below that of the locals. Petty thieves like to target travelers because they are easy victims and they carry rich wallets and purses — ripe pickings.
Countermeasure: Research your destination before your departure. Today nearly everything is on the Web. A few simple keywords like name of city, travel safety advice, and mugging will trigger pages of information. Upon arrival at your destination, ask additional questions. For example, where is the hotel in relation to what you want to do, cost of taxi from the hotel to airport, security, and whether it is safe to walk in the evening.
2. Pickpockets are more likely to steal from a handbag or backpack than from your pocket. It's a misconception to think that thieves are only out for your wallet and cash. Many like credit cards with high limits, or an expensive digital camera or cell phone from your backpack, just as much as cash.Countermeasure: When traveling to new destinations, do what young Europeans do today: carry the backpack on your chest, use small locks to secure the zipper tabs, and never let your handbag dangle behind you while walking. Be particularly vigilant on crowded subways, trams, and buses.
3. Pickpockets are not always slick, skillful Fagin characters. They are more often low-end petty criminals who take advantage of a situation. Often the victims themselves give the pickpocket a golden opportunity. Sneak thieves work on the assumption that they can stalk an inexperienced traveler and find the right moment when he or she is not paying attention and simply grab the purse or bag.Countermeasure: Keep physical contact with your bags or other belongings while visiting coffee houses, Internet cafes, hotel lobbies, restaurants, museums and even churches. It's easy to defeat the opportunist's crude techniques this way.
4. You are most vulnerable in crowded environments like buses and subways. Although pickpocketing often takes place on crowded subway trains or buses, you are also likely to be targeted when your mental guard is down, for example in the first few hours of your arrival. Pickpockets and bag thieves especially like the new fast trains from airports to city centers. And busy train stations are pickpockets' favorite hangouts. Like savannah hunters, they look for the tired, weak, or confused to take advantage of.Countermeasure: Guard your personal space and don't allow strangers to crowd you. Only you can determine what your personal space is. Some people can handle being squeezed from every direction on a Metro in Paris or the subway in Rome. Make certain that you have constant eye contact with your belongings if you leave them on racks or on the floor some distance away from your seat when traveling by train, including to and from the airport. The experienced traveler will protect his valuables with confidence, while others completely lose track of what is happening around them, oblivious to the threats of grabby fingers.
5. Be a bit more cynical when traveling. Pickpockets are sometimes skilled con artists. Not only do they know how to distract you and extract your wallet at the same, but they are also very good at conning the victim into believing that he can be of help. In order to lift your wallet, they need physical contact. Conning thieves devise devious ruses and techniques for pretending that they can assist you in some manner.Countermeasure: One common technique is to squirt something on you without you realizing it. They then approach you a moment or two later and offer to help you clean off the mess, thus gaining your trust. Whenever a total stranger approaches you and starts a conversation, be leery and watch for his or her motive.
6. Some people are more likely to be targets than others. Women are more likely to be targets than men, because they carry handbags and there are no nerve-endings in handbags. People wearing expensive jewelry will catch the thieves' attention, particularly snatch-and-grabbers. Handbags with flap closures catch the eyes of thieves. Loose money in a gaping front pocket is also easy to steal. Anyone with a backpack on his back is especially attractive to thieves while in a crowded subway system — a classic technique in St. Petersburg and Moscow.
Countermeasure: Try not to give off signals of wealth when out walking in unknown areas. Thieves have "grift sense," an ability to quickly size you up. A glance is all it takes for the pickpocket to guess where your wallet or money is. They evaluate how easy it would be to get into your bag or backpack. Make it difficult for them and they'll pass on you and go for someone else. Thieves have no emotion or sympathy towards the elderly. A person with a cane is just another target.
7. New trends among thieves. Theft of blank checks, credit cards and drivers license is a license to steal enormous sums of cash. The new breed of pickpocket is well dressed and blends in at any establishment whether a trendy bar, hotel lobby, breakfast restaurant in a five-star hotel, or even a popular theater in London's West End. And how do you protect yourself against pseudo cops, or someone pointing a camera with a powerful lens at the ATM from across the street? High-end cell phones like the Ericsson P-900 are very attractive targets in most foreign destinations. Never leave a cell phone unguarded on your table in a coffee house or restaurant.Countermeasure: Relaxing in an upscale environment is no guarantee that thieves aren't lurking around any time of the day, including breakfast in hotel restaurants. When checking in or out of your hotel have at the very least eye contact with your valuables, especially laptop computers, PDAs and handbags. Do not put your handbag at your feet during a play in London — keep it in your lap. Be vigilant about shielding your PIN at ATMs. Imagine that a hidden camera nearby could record your number keying and use your hand for cover. If anyone claims to be a police officer and is not in uniform be extremely leery and demand to see multiple IDs and inspect the photo carefully. Speak loud and attempt to get help from locals around you for assistance. Chances are the so-called officers will sneak away quickly.
8. Be prepared for the worst-case scenario, in the event you do lose your travel documents, credit cards or camera. Regardless of how careful you are, you may still lose a bag, a purse or attaché case. Countermeasure: If you're really paranoid about travel security you may want to consider some unusual steps of precaution. For example: You can put a temporary credit limit on the account.Inform your credit card company of your itinerary, especially if it's to unusual destinations. This guarantees that you'll have full access to your card, even though you have changed your travel pattern or spending habit. An extreme cautionary step if you travel with important documents for example, would be to carry a small USB thumb drive with encryption. On the drive you have a scanned PDF file of your passport, important numbers to call in case of an emergency, credit card numbers, 800 numbers to call for card replacements, addresses to the American Embassies in the cities of your planned itinerary, all the important computer documents, and so forth.
9. Simple and cheap devices change the scamming odds in your favor. There is no 100 percent perfect safe pocket for your wallet or money, but there are other means to reduce pickpocketing by at least 90 percent. Before you leave get yourself some simple anti-theft devices, now common over the Internet. You don't need anything fancy. Small pouches with loops, meant to hang from a belt, inside the pants, are the best for men. Flat waist pouches made of polyester are meant to be worn under a shirt or pants. Any hidden bag or pouch makes it difficult, if not impossible, for a pickpocket. Caveat: Wallets, pouches or holsters worn under your garments may give a false sense of security. Some thieves work with razor blades and specialize in cutting the fabric of your pants, bag, or backpack.
Buy small combination locks to attach to the zipper tabs on your backpack. It will stop pickpockets but not thieves working with razor blades. Fortunately, there are far fewer cutpurses than pickpockets who use their fingers. TagAlarm, a new security gadget, is an electronic lock and alarm which is user-programmable. It costs more than a combination lock but it's quicker and easier to open. The deterrent is the same. When a thief sees a locked zipper, he moves on to someone else.
We do not recommend moneybelts in most situations because they are cumbersome. In case of a mugging, you should have "give up" money to throw at the mugger to avoid a deterioration of the hold-up. Decide in advance what you are comfortable giving up to avoid a nasty confrontation, and have this amount in a secondary thin wallet if you must walk in risky locations with uncertain reputations.
10. Don't forget to have fun on your travels.Being overly protective or paranoid about perceived threats can easily ruin the spontaneous fun and thrill about visiting a new country. Understand that all travel is a form of uncertainty mixed with new experiences — if we could anticipate every twist and turn and know what every new acquaintance would lead to (in advance) the journey would be boring and bland. Avoiding complications comes from experience and playing it safe, but not so safe that you reduce the fun.
Also remember, if you plan to take an American cell phone on your trip abroad, you need a tri-band GSM phone. If you already have a GSM-type network contract at home, it is nearly always cheaper to buy a local so-called "top-up" SIM card in the country of your destination and then e-mail the new number to the friends and relatives who need to call you. The SIM card will fit in your regular GSM cell phone. This is only economical when you have a lot of calls to and from the United States. If you are planning to visit more exotic destinations like South Africa, Vietnam or Brazil, for example, also research in advance how the roaming connections will work. Carrying a cell phone abroad adds an additional sense of security for emergencies but also adds one more attractive item for thieves to steal.