SNEAK PEEK
- Koreans will have access to digital IDs powered by blockchain by 2024.
- These digital IDs can be utilized by citizens in finance, taxes, healthcare, and transportation, along with helping businesses transition online.
- The plan would also witness the government adopting a decentralized identity system which will bar them from gaining access to the private information of the users.
In accordance with a recent report, it has been revealed that the South Korean government could soon allow its citizens to utilize digital identification based on blockchain in place of physical cards as soon as 2024. This implies that the nation is advancing toward blockchain technology.
This plan from the Korean Government will witness digital IDs embedded as an application within mobile devices in the future, functioning similarly to the physical resident registration cards. As revealed, around 45 million citizens are expected to adopt this technology within a span of two years.
Hwang Seogwon, an Economist at the Science and Technology Policy Institute, revealed that digital IDs could be further utilized in sectors such as taxes, healthcare, finance, and transportation. Alongside this, it should be noted that Suh Bo Ram, the Director General of Korea’s Digital Government, said that the technology could assist businesses that are struggling to go online.
The plan also includes the adoption of a decentralized identity system by the government, which means the government will not have access to data and information stored on mobile phones along with the digital ID in use and the way they are used.
South Korea is surely leading the way in the blockchain sector and the Metaverse, and it is certainly not the first digital solution based on blockchain that has been put into effect in the country.
Back in the month of August of the year 2020, more than one million South Koreans implemented a driver’s license powered by blockchain that operates via the PASS smartphone application of Korea.
A month after this implementation, a South Korean government agency, Korea Internet & Security Agency (KISA), started pilot testing on a system similar to this.
In accordance with a study conducted in 2021 by ReportLinker, a market research firm, it is estimated that the blockchain identity market will continue to grow a further $3.58 billion by 2025.
