The Bank of Korea (BOK) and Samsung are to test using NFC to make offline central bank digital currency (CBDC) transactions with Galaxy smartphones and smart watches without needing an internet connection.

BOK and Samsung have signed a business agreement to cooperate on research “in the offline payment sector” using “an offline CBDC technology that enables remittance and payment between devices through NFC even when both the transaction devices of the sender and the recipient are not connected to the internet communication network”, Samsung explains.

“Remittance and payment are made within the embedded Secure Element (eSE) installed in Samsung Electronics’ mobile devices. 

“Based on the technology, the two companies plan to use Samsung Electronics’ Galaxy smartphones and watches to minimise security threats that are concerned about offline payments and to continue research to support stable payments even in disaster situations where the network is not connected.

“Based on the results of research cooperation, the two companies plan to continue to seek various ways to cooperate for the development of the CBDC ecosystem in the international community.”

BOK announced in October 2020 that it was planning to start testing a prototype CBDC and reported on the lessons learned from its first CBDC trial using DLT technology in November 2022.

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