Bank of Korea and Samsung Electronics Join Hands for 'Offline CBDC Technology Research Collaboration'

On the 15th, the Bank of Korea and Samsung Electronics signed a business agreement for offline CBDC (Central Bank Digital Currency) technology research cooperation at Samsung Electronics' Suwon Digital City.

Through this business agreement, both parties promised to continue research on the digital currency CBDC issued by the Bank of Korea and to collaborate in the offline payment sector.

The signing ceremony was attended by Lee Seung-heon, Deputy Governor of the Bank of Korea, and Choi Won-jun, Vice President and Head of Development at Samsung Electronics MX Division.

Last year, Samsung Electronics participated in the second phase of the 'CBDC Pilot Experiment Research' conducted by the Bank of Korea. They developed offline CBDC technology that enables remittance and payment between devices via Near Field Communication (NFC) even when both the sender's and receiver's devices are not connected to the internet network.

Remittances and payments using this technology are conducted within the secure chipset (eSE) embedded in Samsung Electronics' mobile devices. This chipset has obtained hardware certification at the CC EAL 6+ level, providing world-class security.

Based on this technology, both parties plan to continue research to minimize security threats during offline payments using Samsung Electronics' Galaxy smartphones and watches, and to support stable payments even in disaster situations where the network is disconnected.

Currently, central banks worldwide are showing great interest in CBDCs and are conducting research projects. Based on the results of their research cooperation, both parties intend to continuously explore various cooperation measures to advance the CBDC ecosystem in the international community.

Deputy Governor Lee said, "I consider it very meaningful to have developed offline CBDC technology for the first time among central banks together with Samsung Electronics," and added, "Through the signing of this MOU between the two parties, I hope Korea will continue to lead the field of offline CBDC technology, which is actively being researched by global central banks."

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