Yallvend, AuthMe and BiiLabs have jointly developed a KYC (know your customer) solution for vending machines to enable them to sell products, such as cigarettes or alcohol, to qualified consumers via personal identity verification, according to Yallvend CEO Duncan Huang.
Yallvend is a mobile payment and cloud-based stock management solutions develolper for vending machines. AuthMe develops digital personal identification technology, while BiiLabs is a distributed ledger technology developer.
AuthMe-developed personal identity verification works by reading data from the passport chip via NFC technology into consumers' smartphones, and then verifying the consumer's identity using facial recognition and algorithm-based liveness detection, company CEO Andy Lee explained. As the specification of passport chips conforms to International Civil Aviation Organization's standards, the personal data contained in such chips are highly reliable in terms of authenticity, Lee noted.
Most of smartphone-read personal data, after being verified, are encrypted while some are processed for being disclosed such as "the person is qualified for buying cigarettes or liquor", BiiLabs COO Amanda Ye said.
The collaboration began in September 2019. The KYC solution is at the POC (proof of concept) stage and is expected to be showcased at CES 2020, Huang noted.
Yallvend has also developed VUK module equipped with a 4G antenna and a QR code sticker for vending machines to enable consumers to use mobile payment and machine operators to conduct cloud-based stock management, Huang said.
AuthMe CEO Andy Lee (left) and Yallvend CEO Duncan Huang
Photo: Yihan Li, Digitimes, December 2019