KNOWLEDGE CENTRE: Collectible coin grading company Collectors Universe is deploying two million NFC tags to enable collectors and dealers to authenticate rare and valuable coins and banknotes.
The rollout by the company’s Professional Coin Grading Service[1] (PCGS) follows “overwhelmingly positive feedback” to an initial deployment of 100,000 HID Trusted NFC tags[2] to test compatibility and customer response.
“Numismatics, or the collecting of rare coins, has a market exceeding an estimated $3bn, and counterfeiters are eager to take a slice of this lucrative market,” HID Global explains in a case study available to download from the NFCW Knowledge Centre[3].
“Product authentication has become a necessity in a day and age when counterfeit coins and banknotes are more sophisticated than ever.
“Collectors Universe needed a solution that would enable their PCGS-certified coins and banknotes to be authenticated immediately, while being scalable enough to roll out to other items in their inventory over time.”
The company worked with HID Global to add NFC technology to its PCGS coin and banknote holders, enabling collectors and dealers to tap their phone on an NFC tag and access information about the collectible item’s authenticity via a unique one-time URL that a counterfeiter cannot clone or manipulate.
“With HID Trusted Tag Services, Collectors Universe is the first in the numismatic industry and among the first in any of the collectibles fields to utilize this type of anti-counterfeiting technology at scale,” says Collectors Universe CIO John Nelson in the case study.
“The technology provides peace of mind to customers who seek reassurance that their investment is going toward a verifiable collectible.
“Now just by tapping their smartphones, collectors and dealers have immediate confirmation
