[Courtesy of LG Uplus]
SEOUL -- For young customers familiar with using new devices, LG Uplus, a mobile carrier in South Korea, opened its first unmanned "contactless" store based on simple authentication and payment. Customers can use services around the clock by issuing QR codes and authenticate themselves with fingerprints and passwords.
If customers enter mobile phone numbers at the entrance, they can easily receive QR codes through simple authentication, LG Uplus (LGU+) said, adding the first unmanned store opened in the center of Seoul to cope with growing demands for non-face-to-face contact amid a COVID-19 pandemic.
"With experience-oriented services that customers see, hear and feel, we will try to gain genuine sympathy from customers and secure true fans," LGU+'s consumer business division head Im Kyung-hoon said in a statement on March 22. A call system for counselors will be provided for customers who are not familiar with using unmanned shops. LGU+ will open additional contactless stores in three other cities this year.
Unlike existing unmanned stores that only support USIM opening or changing devices, LGU+ allows customers to proceed with new subscriptions and number transfers. A subscriber identification module (SIM) is an integrated circuit that is intended to securely store the international mobile subscriber identity (IMSI) number and its related key, which are used to identify and authenticate subscribers on mobile telephony devices.
Customers can choose new smartphones, installment periods, a rate discount method and additional service benefits for themselves. Using kiosks, customers can select pay plans or change numbers and receive purchased smartphones and USIM cards by touching QR codes on unmanned readers.
Simple payment and certification developed by Naver, the country's leading web portal service operator and IT company, were introduced, along with the simplified payment method of credit cards. LGU+ advanced its AI chatbot function by applying a deep learning-based language model. Complex questions such as product comparison and monthly payment calculation can be answered in detail.
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