"Using QR Codes, No Need to Consent Every Time" Simplification of Consent Procedures

[Asia Economy Reporter Joselgina] From the upcoming Chuseok holiday, when visiting multi-use facilities such as restaurants and cafes using QR codes, individuals will no longer need to go through the consent procedure for personal information collection every time. The process has been simplified so that consent is required only once initially.

The Personal Information Protection Commission and the Central Disaster and Safety Countermeasures Headquarters announced on the 27th that they finalized this simplification policy after consultations with QR code issuing agencies such as Naver, Kakao, and PASS, based on field opinions presented during a recent non-face-to-face on-site inspection of personal information management related to the novel coronavirus infection (COVID-19).

Through this measure, the plan is to activate the use of electronic entry logs, whose safety has been confirmed, by enhancing the convenience of QR code usage. According to the entry log management status inspection conducted from July this month, 56.3% of multi-use facilities use both electronic and handwritten entry logs, while 42.5% use only handwritten entry logs.

The Commission explained that handwritten entry logs have concerns such as personal information leakage, failure to destroy, and false entries, whereas electronic entry logs separate user information and facility visit information and are automatically destroyed four weeks after creation.

Previously, the Commission excluded names from the collected items and plans to continuously explore measures to supplement concerns about personal information leakage surrounding handwritten entry logs in the future.

They intend to cooperate so that various ideas emerging from local governments at the forefront of COVID-19 quarantine, such as the ‘Natchang method’ in Guro-gu, Seoul, and the ‘Partition method’ in Jung-gu, Seoul, can be shared and spread nationwide.

Additionally, they will continuously inspect together with local governments to ensure that handwritten entry logs are safely managed and destroyed after four weeks.

Yoon Jong-in, Chairperson of the Personal Information Protection Commission, said, “The use of electronic entry logs is urgently needed both for personal information protection and quarantine,” adding, “We hope that this simplification of the consent procedure will help those who had difficulty using QR codes, such as the elderly, and that the use of electronic entry logs will spread.”

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.