Salzburg, 03. June 2020

The privacy-compliant Health Tag from Authentic Vision provides secure authentication of the health status of individuals in exceptional epidemiological situations and enables them to return to normal life with suitable government and oversight by designated authorities.

1 INTRODUCTION

As COVID-19 has swept the globe, it has become clear that we are living in a new environment that will impact every facet of our society. The pandemic serves as a warning regarding the challenges of continuing critical operations required for the effective functioning of society while protecting “at risk” and unexposed members of our communities. Government and industry, working in collaboration, will need to devise easy-to-implement and practical tools to help governments mitigate these risks and protect publics.

As we have seen, these risks hold the potential to undermine the most critical sectors of our societies and economies. This includes the operation of government, healthcare, private and public businesses, education, and the NGO and non-profit social safety nets that keep our communities connected and assist those in times of need. It is imperative that industry, working in close collaboration with government and other institutions, identify, develop, and implement solutions that enable these organizations and institutions to continue their operations – even during a global pandemic. While there is a wide range of proposed solutions, the ability to verify vaccination or immunity is essential for allowing these organizations to continue operating.

Authentic Vision has developed expertise in physical authentication and verification from its work helping global brands thwart counterfeiting. This specialized and unique skillset is universally applicable to the challenges of vaccination and immunity verification required during and after a pandemic.

2 TESTING AND IMMUNITY VERIFICATION ARE KEY

There has been considerable public discussion about the need for increased immunity testing for the COVID-19 virus. But how will immune individuals verify their immunity as they go about their daily lives?
Immunity verification is critically important because it allows individuals and organizations to make informed decisions about how they can safely interact and move about society. For example, it:

• Allows government agencies and non-profit support organizations to quickly mobilize teams of protected workers able to assist during the pandemic while protecting these workers from infection encroachment that would be disabling to the organization or agency,
• Enables health care organizations to treat patients while protecting health care providers, and better manage emergency, required, and elective surgeries,
• Allows companies to protect employees while continuing critical business operations that safeguard employees’ jobs, shareholder’s investments and company profits.
• Assures educators and administrators of educational continuity and continuation of research under pandemic conditions while protecting students, educators and administrators.
• Enables non-profits and NGOs to provide a range of social and entertainment opportunities that allow communities to thrive even under the stresses of a pandemic.

3 REQUIREMENTS FOR IMMUNITY VERIFICATION SOLUTIONS

As we have considered the challenges created by the COVID-19 pandemic around the globe, our experience suggests an immunity verification solution must meet the following requirements:

• Global compatibility: it must be compatible with and work across the full range of infrastructure found around the globe,
• Flexibility: the solution must be flexible so that it can be implemented quickly on existing global infrastructure immediately and without changes,
• Easy integration with a wide range of existing systems: the solution must be easily integrated with a wide range of processes and systems,
• Ease-of-use: the solution must not require specialized training or skills to use, and
• Trustability: the solution must have already demonstrated success and be trustable under the most demanding situations.

4 SIMPLE AUTHENTICATION FOR “BACK TO NORMAL”

Authentic Vision provides a highly secure and user-friendly technical solution designed to enable vaccinated, tested, or immune individuals to safely revert to their normal lives. This solution can be implemented immediately, ensures privacy and guarantees data protection (GDPR compliance).

The objective is to affix a tamper-proof tag to an existing identification document and provide for electronic verification of immunity or vaccination. This approach provides both a visual and electronic vaccination or immunity verification that can be used in all environments – government, private sector, education, NGOs and non-profits.

The activation of the tag and the associated privileged access rights can be carried out locally by government bodies, health authorities or doctors. The required data is stored directly and in encrypted form on the health tag immediately upon issue.

With the help of this identifier, any approved health-related information can be read by another person, e.g., by law enforcement authorities during a road check, employees of transport companies or security personnel during entry checks. This allows organizations of all types to quickly identify and allow citizens, employees, customers, students, patients, and others access to their facilities with the knowledge that these individuals have been vaccinated or carry immunity to the virus.

5 AUTHENTICATION SOLUTION

The quickly implementable authentication solution consists of three components:

• AV Health Tag: Tamper-proof security labels in different sizes and colors.
• AV Mobile Applications: Authentication using conventional smartphones and a free app.
• AV Smart Portal: Management of the tags and tracking of the authenticity checks.

6 AUTHENTIC VISION HEALTH TAG

The Authentic Vision health tag can be produced in different designs and sizes (see Figure 1). The main features and benefits are:

• Each tag has a unique identification number (alphanumeric)
• The tags are copy-protected by a unique Holographic Fingerprint™ and are superior to other security systems relying on holograms or QR codes.
• The tags become invalid if an attempt is made to remove them and are therefore tamper-proof.

7 AUTHENTIC VISION MOBILE APPLICATIONS

The activation of the tags can be done easily by any health authority (medical facility, hospital, or doctor’s office) with designation of privileges and access rights using the free AV “Admin” application on any smartphone.

The authenticity of the tags can be checked without specialized expertise using any smartphone and the free AV “Authentication” App, based on Android or iOS (see Figure 2). The scan will automatically detect any previous attempts of copying or tampering.

The app can either be integrated into an existing mobile application or published as a stand-alone app in the customer’s design. The message that is displayed after successful authentication can be customized, with information from health authorities and concrete recommendations for action.

8 AUTHENTIC VISION SMART PORTAL

Location data of the authentication checks are stored and can be evaluated using the AV Smart Portal (see Figure 3). The AV Health Tags can be managed comfortably from the Web Portal (e.g., enabled / disabled). Individualized push messages can also be sent via the app.

This process is 100% data protection compliant (GDPR compliant), as the connection between a person and their classification or test result is limited to the physical connection between the tag and the respective ID document. At no time is personal information stored in the label system. Only the rating or test results are stored.

9 BACKGROUND ON AUTHENTIC VISION, GMBH

Authentic Vision GmbH, headquartered in Salzburg (Austria), is a technology company focusing on the protection of products and brands against product piracy. The company has operations in the US through its wholly-owned subsidiary, Authentic Vision Inc.

Backed by 59 patents worldwide, Authentic Vision provides a random and unique security feature in the form of a holographic shield. The solution is used worldwide in a wide range of industries and by well-known companies.

Examples from Authentic Vision’s customer portfolio:

CONTACT

Martin Steib, Authentic Vision

Email: martin.steib@AuthenticVision.com