Age Verification to Prevent Sale of Age-restricted Products to Minors

Last updated on June 23rd, 2022 at 04:28 am

Along with having a moral responsibility to check the age of customers, businesses are affected by the presence of an age verification service. 

enterprises earn a bad reputation if they give access to age-restricted products and services to minors for not having a good age verification system.

What is Age Verification?

The age verification service is implemented to check whether a client is over the allowed age to be given access to a specific website or platform. In the modern era, the manual method of age verification is becoming obsolete, and online verification service is making its way in the marketplace. 

How does Age Verification Services Work?

The age verification process takes place in the following way:

• Firstly, when the customer accesses a particular website with an age verification service, they are required to provide their date of birth.
• Then, the system asks the customer to show their government-issued ID card on the webcam.
• The system checks the card for verification and authenticity.
• If the document provided is valid, it is checked whether the data on the ID card is the same as the one provided by the customer at the start of the process.
• When the age is cross-checked and verified, then it is checked whether the age of the customer is above the required age limit or not.
• In the end, the result is shown to the customer and shared with the client or business

Industries that Require Age Verification

In most countries around the world, age verification is necessary for various industries to screen individuals for their age before providing any age-restricted products or services. It is especially true for some parts of Europe and the US. However few industries, such as gaming, gambling, pharmaceuticals, and tobacco have to implement KYC/AML regulations that are lieu with their respective territories. 

Gaming Industry 

The gaming industry has skyrocketed in most parts of Europe, especially in Germany – where every year millions of new users come on board. The gaming industry has to adapt to the new rules and regulations that would help in complying with the age verification requirements. 

Tobacco Stores 

Tobacco stores or industries are restricted by law to sell products related to smoking or drinking. With the digitalization of tobacco and alcohol stores, it became easier for minors to purchase these products by showing their parent’s IDs. With identity verification, avoiding age verification became complicated as software takes a screenshot of a person’s face and compares it to the person’s ID card. 

As age verification is required by the law of most countries, industries looking to abide by KYC/AML regulations have to ensure they are keeping up with the new laws and regulations. Checking minors for their identity before any purchase has become imperative that could cost industries heavy penalties and fines. 

Why age verification is important?

Age verification can prevent businesses from chargebacks over non-consensual use of credit cards by minors. Children use their parent’s credit cards to purchase illegal or age-restricted goods online. The money along with the information can be transferred to a scammers account.

If businesses don’t properly utilize age verification methods to counter such problems, it will lose credibility and could even face penalties. Fraudsters can fake their identity and take financial advantage of these accounts. Like pension, provident fund and old-age benefits are most desirable by fraudsters. 

Children could also access and view age-restricted content that is accessible to people over the age of 18. As it’s illegal for minors to view such content online, an age verification tool is mandatory for the sites to check and verify their audience before giving access. However, most gambling sites are run by online scammers that pose a potential risk in stealing the identities of minors. These platforms can enhance their user experience by employing age verification. Online shopping sites that are selling age-exclusive products essentially need age verification. 

KYC (Know Your Customer) solutions providers offer reliable solutions for age verification. Incorporating various features and services within the KYC standards would result in enhancing the customer experience. The age verification system would help businesses accelerate further into the future, where they are more secure from online threats presented by people with malicious intent.