Digital key, which processes user authentication on mobile, is being used in various areas.

Authentication refers to a process that checks whether a user has the qualification to use a certain space or service. It’s a mandatory security technology for personal information, finance, proving the ownership of a certain product, etc. The simplest and most well-known authentication means is a key. Owning a key itself shows that an owner has the qualification. You may think of a metal key, which is the physically realized version, but these days passwords and biological recognition means such as fingerprint and iris also function as keys. As mobile phones are used as personalized devices, a phone itself is becoming a self-proving authentication medium. Digital key, which is used for user authentication on mobile, is utilized in various areas.

On-tact Lodging Service Realized by Digital Key

As an on-tact service, a hotel provides the digital key, which allows you to enter your room with just your smartphone (photography source. Hilton HONORS).

The most well-known case would be digital key used in the lodging business. Digital keys are provided to customers for hotels and resorts so that they can enter their rooms using their mobile phones. If a service is to be provided with online check-in, we may be able to have on-tact service, which refers to ‘connection without contact’, amidst the times of virus such as COVID-19.

Hilton Worldwide Holdings, which has shares for 4,700 hotels around the world including Hilton Hotel, Conrad Hotel, Curio, Doubletree, etc., provides their customers with digital key. During their stay, people can enter their rooms with the digital key and do uncontact check-in and check-out.

Walt Disney World Resort also allows using digital key via their official app My Disney Experience, which provides various services such as the Disney World map and entrance ticket management. With the digital key, people can not only enter their rooms but also enter public places such as the hotel entrance, elevators, club lounge, fitness center, etc. With future pass functions for Disney World, it may be the perfect Disney World digital key.

Digital Key Based Idle Asset Sharing Service

Digital key is also used in the sharing economy (photography source. Slock.it blog).

Digital key can also be used well in the sharing economy. slock.it from Germany would be the most prominent enterprise of the kind. slock.it is an enterprise that provides the block chain-based sharing economy service. Required contract conditions required can be registered on block chain, and when such conditions are met, transaction is carried out automatically, delivering the digital key to a user. It’s like the famous lodging sharing service Airbnb realizes in block chain and digital key.

For example, let’s say that a homeowner who is to leave home for a quite a while for a business trip registers the conditions for a lease including price, etc., on block chain. A user who wishes to lease the house for a short while can pay the required amount and immediately receive the digital key. The rights to the digital key will expire upon the lease completion. slock.it is working on services to provide personal assets like cars and bicycles aside from real estate via block chain based digital key.

Digital Key Service Which Can Be Expanded to Smart Home

You can use digital key to provide smart home service (photography source. Amazon).

Using digital key may make short-term use of entering a certain space to provide additional service. It can be especially useful for delivery service. Amazon and Wallmart have introduced a service where a product is delivered inside your house via smart door lock. When a delivery man visits your house, he/she can go through the authentication process, and upon homeowner’s approval, the door lock will open for the delivery man to leave a product inside the home. Homeowners can check the delivery real time as the delivery process is recorded on camera.

If digital key was to be applied to the process, homeowner’s approval process could be omitted, and one-time digital key could be used for an even more convenient delivery service. Linked with the purchase history, the digital key could limit home entrance times while delivery guy’s information could be confirmed before and after the delivery to minimize any misuse of the digital key. Amazon not only makes deliveries but provides various home services such as house cleaning, repairs, and installation of electronic goods and furniture. All these services can be provided based on digital key as well.

Digital Key Provides Evolving Mobility Service.

Recently Hyundai Motors also has introduced the digital key for car pick-up and chauffeur driving service.

Various services using digital key for mobility, which is evolving into a moving lifestyle space and acting as something more than just a vehicle, are much anticipated as well. On September 14th, Hyundai Motors introduced many digital key-based services including ‘pick-up and chauffeur,’ which allows picking up a car for chauffeur driving using digital key even if the car and a customer are at different locations, and ‘pick-up and delivery,’ which delivers a car to a desired location via digital key without a customer riding in it. From October, the service will be expanded to all around the country except Jejudo. These services resulted from the trend of mobility of being a lifestyle space.

Other services can also be expected; most digital key cases we’ve seen previously can also be applied to mobility services. There are car sharing or lending which allows lending a car with digital key during the time you don’t use your car, a service that gets products delivered by making use of digital key that allows access to your car trunk, the digital key based delivery service involving cleaning the outside and inside of your car, etc.

Digital key will act as a platform and connect services in various areas.

Digital key allows the connection of services in various areas, just like a platform. Online or mobile connections mean collecting and making use of data. It will entail opportunities to provide additional services. For example, the driving habits of drivers who make use of digital key can be analyzed to apply different types of insurances or make recommendations of useful information such as gas stations and restaurants depending on each driver’s parking pattern.

Mobility service using digital key has just begun. It will go beyond simple car entering, starting, and moving; there is much anticipation regarding what kind of services it can be connected to.

Written by. Hyun Kyung-min (Connecting Lab)