There's a pilot program happening in California that retailers across the country might well be interested in. The CA DMV is trialing TruAge, the age verification tool developed by NACS and Connexus, as an optional add-on feature to the recently rolled-out mobile driver's license (mDL). Instead of a customer showing their driver's license with all their personal information, TruAge generates a unique QR code that proves the customer is of legal age for purchases like alcohol or tobacco.

Once activated, TruAge makes purchasing age-restricted products easier and safer for customers because of its speed, limited access to personal data, and encrypted ID token, which ensures that purchases can't be linked to a customer's name.

How does TruAge work?

In the California pilot, the customer activates the technology in their mobile driver's license. When they show the license at checkout, an employee scans a unique QR code directly from the customer's phone. The TruAge software verifies identity, and the employee sees a photo of the customer and confirmation that the customer is of legal age.

How can retailers benefit from age verification technology?

According to NACS, convenience stores process 54 million age-restricted transactions every day, conducting 20 times more ID checks daily than the TSA. Manually verifying customer information is time-consuming and error-prone, and increasingly, retailers are turning to ID scanners to improve accuracy and save time. Adding TruAge technology to mobile driver's licenses can provide several benefits:

• Eliminates human error. When an employee scans a customer's QR code in the app, TruAge immediately returns a clear result.
• Adds proof-of-age verification directly to transaction logs. Retailers have proof that age was verified at the time of the transaction.
• Improves employee compliance with age restrictions. Retailers can pull reports for their store to show if age was verified or if the verification process was bypassed.
• Retailer retains ownership of customer data. As TruAge is a not-for-profit tool, there's no fee, and all customer data is retained by the retailer, which means you also protect your customers from privacy violations and data breaches.

How Minor Decliner can help

At Minor Decliner, we are proud to be the first ID scanning company to be TruAge Certified, and several of our ID scanners are ready to read California’s new mobile driver's licenses.

Ready to Learn More?

Contact Minor Decliner today to see how our ID scanners can help you with age verification and reducing the risk of selling age-restricted products to minors.