Duty-Free Shopping Without a Passport... Lotte Myeon Introduces Mobile Service

Valid for up to 10 years with a single certification

As long as you have a smartphone, you can now enjoy duty-free shopping at downtown duty-free shops without a passport.

Lotte Duty Free has introduced the 'Mobile Passport Service,' the first of its kind in the duty-free industry. The photo shows a Lotte Duty Free employee demonstrating the 'Mobile Passport Service.' Photo by Lotte Duty Free

Lotte Duty Free announced on the 20th that it has exclusively introduced the 'Mobile Passport Service.' With the introduction of this service, foreign and domestic members of Lotte Duty Free can now enjoy duty-free shopping at the Seoul Myeongdong Main Store and World Tower Store using a mobile passport. The Busan and Jeju stores will also adopt the service as soon as the approval process is completed. The mobile passport can be easily registered by accessing the 'My Page' tab within the Lotte Duty Free application. Once authenticated for the first time, it can be used for up to 10 years, the validity period of the passport.

First, information such as the passport number and expiration date is initially recognized through the camera OCR (Optical Character Recognition) function. Then, by placing the smartphone on top of the passport, the electronic passport IC chip is automatically scanned. After that, a QR code applying digital decentralized identity (DID) blockchain technology is issued, completing the mobile passport registration.

Lotte Duty Free has strengthened security through two-way authentication using OCR and the electronic passport IC chip, and also conducts real-time verification using the public network databases of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the Ministry of Justice to check the passport’s validity and stay period. Furthermore, the QR code generated when using the mobile passport is regenerated every 30 seconds to completely prevent unauthorized use.

Kim Joo-nam, CEO of Lotte Duty Free, said, "With the government's active support to restore the competitiveness of Korea's duty-free industry, we have proactively introduced the mobile passport service. We will strive to enable both domestic and foreign customers using Lotte Duty Free to enjoy more convenient downtown duty-free shopping."

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