It's not often that you encounter a solution in the identity space that both elegantly and efficiently solves a complex challenge. I had the privilege of leading the product design and end-user research for our new Identity Attribute Verification service as part of the amazing Innovation team. This new service is based on EMV 3DS meant to exchange and verify additional data related to identity attributes like age and name. This extension helps meet regulatory requirements that mandate the verification of specific attributes for various activities, such as making age-restricted purchases or accessing age-restricted content.

Why is it important?

The answer is straightforward, at least from a data privacy perspective. When you try to buy an age-restricted product online, like alcohol, you're often asked to verify your age. This usually involves scanning and uploading an identity document for verification. However, by doing this, you're sharing much more information than the merchant actually needs — confirming you're over 18 or 21 (not your date of birth nor your age).

The guiding principle of our Privacy by Design culture means using only the necessary data consumers have agreed to share in order to complete the verification.

Let's see how Mastercard's Identity Attribute Verification solution works in the following example, where the user purchases an age-restricted product.

The user experience

The most noticeable aspect of the example above is consistency with a regular Card-not-present (CNP) checkout flows. In fact, after selecting Mastercard as a age verification method, the experience is almost identical - no downloading a wallet or identity app, sending a video of yourself or uploading an identity document - simply pay and verify your age with one simple tap.

As a product designer, I believe that inconsistent user experiences when it comes to identity verification, can cause confusion and create a significant barrier to adoption. This inconsistency could also result in cart abandonment - one of the primary KPIs for merchants or service providers.

What do users say

We tested a combination of attribute verification only and alongside payments in several European markets (France, Germany, Austria, and the UK), and the feedback was very positive from the very initial design draft. Here are a couple of quotes:

"The age verification process using my payment card was very easy to complete."

"It was incredibly easy. Its much better than having to upload a picture of a ID card. Especially when the ID card must go through a software procedure of checking it is legit."

"Very easy! And fast."

Finally, user feedback was instrumental in shaping our solution. It not only helped us identify areas for improvement but also guided us in refining the design to meet user needs more effectively. As a result, we were able to develop a polished "gold standard" that sets a high benchmark across multiple use cases, ensuring a seamless and consistent user experience. To me this is #Priceless.

Read more here: Inside Mastercard's identity attribute verification | Mastercard Newsroom