Your brain still matters when your tech disappears.
We depend on our phones to remember almost everything for us—contacts, logins, schedules, directions, even our banking access. But all that convenience becomes a serious liability when you lose your phone, it gets stolen, or someone manages to hack into it. Suddenly, your entire life feels locked behind a black screen or compromised by a stranger, and you’re left scrambling to recover. It’s not just inconvenient—it’s paralyzing if you don’t have some key information stored where no one can take it.
That’s why it’s smart to commit a few crucial details to memory. Not everything—just the stuff that will help you survive a digital blackout, secure your accounts, and reach help when everything else fails. You don’t need a photographic memory, just a short list of information that could give you a major edge in a stressful moment. Losing your phone or getting hacked doesn’t have to be a total disaster—if your brain’s got a small backup plan, you’ll be able to stay calm and take action while everyone else panics. These ten things are worth memorizing now, before the next tech hiccup leaves you stranded.
1. Your main email address and password.
Your primary email is usually the gateway to everything—banking, social media, cloud backups, and two-factor authentication. If you lose access to your phone or device, you’ll need to log into this account to start recovering anything else. That means memorizing both the exact email address and a strong but recallable password, according to Maya Amor at the Art of Memory. This isn’t the time for guesswork or hoping autofill saves you.
Choose a password that’s long, unique, and memorable using a method like a passphrase or pattern with personal meaning. You don’t need to know every password for every site, but you absolutely need to know this one. Without it, you’re stuck, and even services with support desks will treat you like a stranger without verified access to your email. One account, one password—memorized cold—can unlock everything else.
2. Your main phone number.
It’s surprisingly easy to forget your own phone number when you rely on tapping contacts or seeing it auto-filled in apps. But if you ever need to borrow someone’s phone to call your carrier or verify your identity, you’ll need to say your number out loud. This is especially important when you’re reporting a stolen device or trying to port your number to a new SIM card.
Memorizing your number also helps with everything from reactivating two-factor authentication to logging into social media and banking services that use your number as a recovery method, as reported by the people at Strategy Driven. It’s one of the few pieces of data that both strangers and systems will ask for to prove you are who you say you are. Knowing it by heart can shave hours off the recovery process.
3. A trusted person’s number.
You can’t always count on remembering usernames or email logins in a panic, but having a real person to call can make a massive difference. That’s why you should memorize at least one trusted contact—someone who can vouch for you, receive verification codes, or help lock down your accounts, as stated by Dr. Janet Hurley at The Morning Telegraph. A partner, sibling, or close friend is ideal.
If your phone is lost or hacked, this person becomes your communication lifeline. They can confirm your identity when you contact services, offer a second device to log into accounts, or even meet you in person with whatever you need. Having their number locked in your memory means you’ll always have someone to reach, no matter what else goes wrong.
4. Your bank’s phone number and account details.
When your phone goes missing or gets compromised, your money could be the next thing at risk. That’s why you should memorize your bank’s customer service number along with the last four digits of your account. This is often enough to verify yourself and freeze a card, issue a fraud alert, or get back into your account.
Most people scramble through apps to find this info—but if you lose access to your apps, you’re left with nothing. Even writing the info on paper somewhere safe is smart, but memorizing the basics can get you immediate help. Your financial safety often comes down to how fast you can make that call and sound like you know what you’re talking about.
5. A few key passwords that unlock critical services.
You don’t need to memorize everything, but a handful of passwords should live in your head. Your email and mobile carrier account are obvious, but you might also include your Apple ID or Google login, your main bank account, and any cloud storage or password manager credentials.
These are the accounts that act as hubs for recovery. If you’re locked out of them, regaining access to everything else gets harder or even impossible. Choose passwords that are secure but can be encoded with meaning that only you understand. If you’ve got even three or four of these memorized, you’re way ahead of the average person in a crisis.
6. Your home address.
It sounds basic, but many people don’t need to type out their address anymore because everything is prefilled on forms or auto-saved in profiles. If you’ve moved recently or don’t use your address often, it can be embarrassingly easy to blank on the details under stress.
Memorizing your full address—including apartment number and ZIP code—comes in handy when verifying identity with customer service or filing a police report about a stolen phone. It’s also useful for navigating in unfamiliar places if you’ve lost your phone and need to get home the old-fashioned way.
7. The answers to your most-used security questions.
Even though security questions are less common these days, many older accounts still rely on them for backup recovery. The catch? People often forget which answer they used, especially when the questions are vague or silly—like “favorite color” or “first car.” And if you made something up years ago to be clever, good luck recalling it under pressure.
Pick a few questions you know you’ve answered consistently, and commit those answers to memory. Make sure they’re not easily guessable, but also not so obscure that even you can’t remember them. These answers can be the difference between getting back into an account or being permanently locked out.
8. Your phone’s IMEI or serial number.
This one’s easy to forget but incredibly useful if your phone gets stolen. The IMEI (International Mobile Equipment Identity) is a unique number assigned to your device. Law enforcement and mobile carriers use it to track, blacklist, or recover stolen phones. Knowing this number can give you leverage when reporting your loss or activating a replacement.
You can find your IMEI by dialing *#06# on most phones or checking the original box if you still have it. If you don’t want to memorize the full number, keep it stored safely outside your phone or write it on a card tucked in your wallet. It’s a small detail that could make a huge difference if your phone disappears.
9. Your mobile carrier login info.
If your phone is lost or compromised, your mobile carrier is often your first point of contact. You’ll need to log into your account to suspend your service, switch SIMs, or set up a new device. That’s why you should memorize the username and password—or at least the login method—you use with your carrier.
Even a temporary phone can’t be activated without this info. Having it on hand allows you to quickly regain control of your number and stop anyone else from accessing your calls or texts. If your carrier also uses two-factor authentication, make sure you know a backup method in case your old phone is out of reach.
10. Your personal identification number (PIN) for your device.
It’s easy to rely on Face ID or fingerprint unlock until the moment it fails. If your device restarts, gets locked out, or you’re forced to use a different device, you’ll need your passcode. That could be a six-digit PIN, a longer password, or even a pattern lock.
Without it, you can’t recover your phone’s contents, and you might not even be able to access backups. Memorizing this simple code ensures that even if you regain your device after a loss, you’re not stuck at the lock screen. It’s the last gate between you and your data—and you don’t want to be the one holding the wrong key.