Wander wisely. Not all roads are honest. (my favourite quote this week)
Hello Hello 👋
Note: As I shared the new name in the 100th edition of this newsletter – LensLetter – I’m glad you like it. Starting next week, the email address will change to [email protected]. Everything else stays the same including sender name, and no action is needed on your side except adding the new email to your contact list. Thank you, and now enjoy this LensLetter!
Remember when travel scams were obvious? Those broken English emails promising “amazing hotel deal for you my friend” were easy to spot from a mile away.
Not anymore.
Scammers have upgraded their game with AI, and they’re getting scary good at it. Fake flight deals, lookalike rental sites, urgent messages to “book now before midnight”—they’re getting smarter, slicker, and harder to spot.
But here’s the thing – while they’ve gotten smarter, so can you.
🚀 Here’s your armor against digital pickpockets:
⛵ The AI Advantage Scammers Are Using
Scammers are using AI to create real-looking listings with real flight schedules, hotel names, and even real-sounding reviews. They’re pulling real flight schedules, actual hotel rates, and legitimate-looking graphics to build websites that mirror the real deal.
The scariest part? They’re creating that sense of urgency we all fall for. “Book now or lose this deal forever!” Sound familiar? That adrenaline rush combined with FOMO (fear of missing out) is exactly what they’re counting on.
Every passport stamp tells a story, but every photo tells the emotion.
🚀 Red Flags That Should Make You Pause 🚩
⛵ The “Act Now” Pressure
If someone’s pushing you to book immediately – especially with phrases like “expires at midnight” – take a breath. Legitimate deals don’t vanish in hours.
⛵ Too-Good-to-Be-True Pricing
Found a beachfront villa for the price of a hostel bed? That’s your brain’s alarm system going off. Listen to it.
⛵ Suspicious Payment Requests
Nobody – and I mean nobody – legitimate asks for payment in cryptocurrency, gift cards, or apps like Venmo. If they do, run.
⛵ Sponsored Search Results
Those top results marked “Ad” in your search? They’re paid placements. Scammers love buying these spots.
Adventure is priceless; scams are costly.
🚀 Your Defence Strategy
⛵ The Reverse Image Search Trick
Found an amazing rental property? Right-click on the photos and search Google for the same image. If it shows up for multiple locations with different names, you’ve caught a scammer red-handed.
⛵ Domain Detective Work
Look at that web address carefully. Scammers create lookalike domains by switching letters or adding symbols. One wrong character can lead you to a fake site.
⛵ Payment Protection
Stick to credit cards or secure digital wallets like Apple Pay. They offer fraud protection that other payment methods don’t. Avoid debit cards for online purchases – they pull directly from your bank account with fewer safety nets.
⛵ Manual Navigation
Don’t click links in emails or ads, even if they look legitimate. Type the website address directly into your browser instead.
Good trips start with good habits.
🚀 Tech Habits for Safer Travel
⛵ Before You Leave:
- Back up your data (in case devices get lost or stolen)
- Leave sensitive documents at home
- Set up a VPN for public WiFi protection
- Update your security software
⛵ While Traveling:
- Watch who’s looking over your shoulder at screens
- Verify public WiFi with staff before connecting
- Save sensitive transactions for private, secure locations
- Use credit cards for any bookings on the road
🚀 Bonus Tip: The 24-Hour Rule
Found an incredible deal that’s making your heart race? Give yourself 24 hours before booking. Sleep on it. If it’s legitimate, it’ll still be good tomorrow. If it’s a scam, that cooling-off period might save you thousands.
The bottom line?
Scammers are getting craftier, but they’re still relying on our impulses and emotions. Stay calm, stay skeptical, and always remember – if something seems too good to be true, it probably is.
Your trip should be memorable for the right reasons—not because you got scammed out of your dream holiday.
🟢 Until the next one, Keep chasing horizons, one frame at a time and let’s be mindful of our environment.
Cheers!!
🍾 Photo of the week
For Print of any photos please reply here with photo link/url.
🚀 Planning Trip, Check 🔻
⛳ Other fun stuff
✔️ New prints are available in the shop, check it out.
✔️ Rahul’s Newsletter – Learning & Sharing Concepts Beyond Text Books. The JustDraft is a free newsletter to receive ideas shared with 2400+ people each week directly to your inbox. Join now to start practising change.
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✔️ UK Weekender – Wondering where to go next weekend. Join Weekender and receive travel insights from the UK, epic photography spots every week in your inbox.
🚀 Here are the tools I found interesting in last few weeks and still exploring
- 🎋 UnifyLabs is an AI-powered video and image editing platform that automates and simplifies the creation of professional visual content for social media, e-commerce, agency work, SaaS, and websites.
- 🎋 CAImera Get ideas for your campaigns, and create high quality AI generated images as per your brand’s requirements
- 🎋 Let’s Enhance uses AI to automatically enhance and upscale images, allowing users to improve resolution, colors, lighting, and remove JPEG artifacts without manual editing.
📆 Product update/offer
In this section, I share any cool new product, feature released in past few weeks or newsletter subscriber only offers
✔ Luminar Neo Lifetime (desktop only) – only $119 (Includes 100 creative add-ons + Neo video course worth $79 + 1 year of Generative AI tools for free)
🎁 [Offer for you] Epidemic Sound introduced Sync to video – Cool feature if you want to quickly make video with great sound collection.
