Its .mil stuff, I wasn't looking for military stuff just a legal size zipper binder which seem to be rare.

http://www.raineinc.com/CatItemDetail.as...&Item=0037B

Wasn't cheap either, then I had to order the sheet protectors in legal size as well, and ordered them archival quality while I was at it.

I'll reiterate the main part of my philosophy: It's all about layered security. Some people here are downing online backup services. Somebody else made this point above: That's ONE layer of security. I have an online backup. I also have many of the same backups the original poster has discussed. Each layer has advantages and disadvantages the other layers do not have.

I don't worry about most of this kind of stuff.

No one is going to care one iota about me proving I belong to a particular church in some kind of emergency.

Nor am I going to need a copy of my birth certificate or marriage license.

Government has records of who is married to who and when they were born. If those records are not accessible, you have far worse problems than the lack of a marriage license.

Medical records can be scanned, but there is no guarantee anyone on the other end will be able to use them in a practical way. It sounds like a great idea, but not many people have medical conditions that make having these kind of records available all that important. There are some people that it might matter for though. The problem is that scanned medical records are just not especially useful much of the time. For instance, you can't scan diagnostic imaging and come out with anything useful.

It might be handy to have a social security card in case you need to find work, but a scan or copy of the card is not going to do you any good.

It's a million times easier to throw away a scan of a document than to generate it out of thin air. Plus, many of the backup systems discussed here are basically effortless after the initial setup.

One thing I have is my kids shot records. I read about those issues to people who left NO, school systems wanted proof of shots before allowing the kids to be registered, parents couldn't get it through to the administrators that they would have had to have all those same shots to be in the school they were in previously.

I would submit that in a Katrina like incident, having to get some extra immunizations is not really a huge problem. But, it is an example of where it might be a handy thing to have, assuming the authorities accept the records that you provide. My understanding is that some school districts even verify the immunizations. If there is no one they can verify them with, the records don't count. I have also read where some districts will not accept copies of immunization records as proof.

On the bright side, I have no kids so do not have to worry a whole lot about this particular problem, and I have no medical issues that might find these kind of records useful.

It seems to me I read about some kind of medical record service where they store your records in some kind of useful electronic form and give you a dog tag to wear so a medical provider can access those records. Don't know much about it, but it would seem like a useful thing. Far more useful and secure than paper records would be.

I've read about those services, they have been talked about on these forums too. You have several issues, most of those services use their own special software which means if the company goes out of business or gets bought by another or changes the file structure in a new version then you may not be able to retrieve those records anymore.
Then there is the issue of the Dr/EMT isn't going to just stick a usb drive in their computer, too easy to get a virus.

I was surprised that when registering our kids for school,they took our copy as word, they didn't ask how or who to verify with.

I suspect school districts practices on verification varies widely. I know some districts in the Chicago suburbs have been known to send a social worker around to check and see if your kid actually lives where you claim he lives because they don't want to be educating kids who do not live in their district. The district next door might do no checking at all.

I believe the dog tag they give you is only a way to identify you to the system. I don't think it holds the actual information on you. It just alerts the hospital that the data is available to be accessed, via the Internet no doubt. I don't know the actual mechanism, and it did not interest me enough to look real close. I don't believe it is something an EMT would be able to access.

I don't know about the file format issue. What I had read one place was it is a standard format that is in use because the federal government mandated it.

I carry a chip with my important information (encrypted of course)and have found it very useful. I would assume the same for the document folder mentioned above.

Having copies of your important documents makes it much easier to get certified copies from the issuing agency. Things like my drivers license number make my local Dept of Motor Vehicles happy when I need a duplicate license.

Likewise when filling out a medical form, I have a record of the dates of various injuries, shots, past doctors names etc.

Perhaps the copies are not legal in some circumstances, but it is much better than my memory.

Nomad.

I actaully have a document that contains all the info. Each scanned image is OLE linked into the page in the document. So basically if I were to loose the document binder or have to leave the house without it and it were to be lost then I can simply open my doc and hit print and its dupliceted as close as I can get without originals. For example the SScard is slipped in an avery business card holder and that page of the doc is a copy of the avery business card template with the ss# card is in that spot. Other things that may not be real important but are in there as well. For example the card that says I passed a hunter's safety course is in there, to buy a hunting license in some states (OH and WV which I live in OH and own farm land in WV and e-ther require taking of the safety course). Thats not real important, if it were ever lost I would just have to go retake the course but that binder is basically a way to organize all those things in one place. So say I want to buy a huntng license online and it asks for the id# from that card, I just go to that info document and pull it up.
Things like insurance id cards are there, say we were hurt in a house fire or torando and I lost my wallett with my insurance cards, that binder has them so I'd grab it to give the hospital.