You’re three hours into a five-hour drive to visit family for the holidays. Your kid asks, “Can I play Roblox on your laptop?” Your work laptop. The one with patient records, financial documents, or confidential client files. You’re tired, the road is long, and it seems harmless to hand it over.
That’s exactly how most holiday data breaches start.
Holiday travel throws you off your routine. You’re distracted, you’re swapping between family time and quick work check-ins, and you’re connecting to networks you’d never use at home. It’s the perfect storm for mistakes that put business data at risk.
Here’s how to protect your information without turning your trip into a full-time security drill.
Before You Leave: A Fifteen-Minute Checklist
A little prep before you walk out the door prevents most travel-related security issues.
Secure your devices
- Install all updates
- Back up important files to the cloud
- Turn on automatic screen locking (two minutes or less)
- Enable “Find My Device” on laptops and phones
- Fully charge your power bank
- Bring your own charging cables and adapters
Prepare your family
- Explain which devices kids can use and which they cannot
- Bring a dedicated family tablet for games and streaming
- If kids must use your laptop, create a separate, restricted account
A $150 tablet for travel is far cheaper than a breach involving sensitive work data.
Hotel Wi-Fi: The Most Misused Convenience on the Road
Most families walk into a hotel room and connect everything immediately. Phones, tablets, laptops, gaming devices — all on the same shared network with hundreds of strangers.
Cybercriminals know this. Fake Wi-Fi networks are common, and once you connect, everything you send can be captured.
How to stay safe
- Ask the front desk for the correct Wi-Fi name before connecting
- Use a VPN whenever accessing work accounts
- Use your phone’s hotspot for anything sensitive, including banking, email, or company documents
- Keep personal streaming and business activity separate
Your kids watching cartoons on hotel Wi-Fi is fine. You reviewing client files is not.
When Your Kids Ask to Use Your Work Laptop
It’s normal on long trips. They’re bored, they want to stream, play games, or video chat friends. But work devices contain email access, client information, financial systems, and internal documents.
Kids don’t mean to cause problems, but they click on pop-ups, download games, and leave accounts logged in. That’s all it takes.
Better options
- Bring a family device
- Keep your work laptop off-limits
If sharing is unavoidable:
- Create a separate user account
- Block downloads
- Supervise what they're doing
- Clear browser history afterward
It’s not about saying “no” — it’s about protecting the data you’re responsible for.
Streaming on Hotel TVs: The Forgotten Log-Out
Logging into Netflix or Hulu on the hotel TV is convenient, and walking out the next morning without logging out is easy to forget.
The next guest then has access to your account and, if your passwords overlap, they may try them elsewhere.
Safer approach
- Use your own device and cast to the TV
- Set a reminder on your phone to log out before checkout
- Download shows in advance to avoid using hotel TVs at all
Never log into any account with payment information on a hotel television.
When a Device Goes Missing
Holiday travel is chaotic. Phones get left at security checkpoints. A laptop gets forgotten in a rental car. A tablet gets left at a restaurant.
What matters most is how quickly you act.
In the first hour
- Use “Find My Device”
- If you can’t recover it immediately, remotely lock it
- Change passwords from another device
- Contact your IT provider or MSP to revoke system access
- If sensitive data was on the device, begin notification procedures
Before you ever travel
- Enable tracking
- Use strong passwords
- Turn on encryption
- Make sure remote wipe is functional
Losing a device is stressful, but losing data is far worse. Preparation keeps an inconvenience from becoming an emergency.
The Rental Car Data Trap
Connecting your phone to a rental car for navigation or music seems harmless. But many vehicles store your contacts, call history, and even message previews.
Most drivers never clear that data before returning the car.
Before you turn in the vehicle
- Delete your phone from Bluetooth
- Clear GPS destinations
- Avoid connecting if you can use your phone’s speaker or an aux cable
A few seconds of cleanup protects your personal and business information from strangers.
The “Working Vacation” Boundary Problem
You told yourself you weren’t working on this trip, but you’ve checked email a dozen times, taken calls, and squeezed in “just a little” work while your family is enjoying themselves.
When you’re tired, multitasking, and rushing between roles, you’re more likely to click something unsafe or use a network you shouldn’t.
If you can’t fully unplug, set limits:
- Check work twice a day at set times
- Use your hotspot, not public Wi-Fi
- Work in private spaces, not lobbies
- Be fully present when you’re off work
Your business needs you focused more than it needs you available every minute of a vacation.
A Practical Holiday Travel Security Mindset
Perfection isn’t realistic. Families are unpredictable. Travel is messy.
The goal is to reduce risk, not eliminate every possibility.
Keep these principles in mind:
- Prepare your devices before you leave
- Know which actions are high-risk
- Keep work data separate from family devices
- Have a plan if something goes wrong
- Set clear boundaries between work and personal time
You can protect your business without wrecking your holiday.
Make This Season Memorable for the Right Reasons
The holidays should be about people you care about — not scrambling to recover lost data or dealing with a preventable breach. With a little planning and some simple habits, your business stays secure and your family still gets your attention.
If you want help building simple, practical travel-security protocols for your team, I can walk you through it in a quick 15-minute conversation.
Schedule here:
https://www.mypropellerheads.com/discoverycall/
