According to reporting by WatchPro, the application includes an NFT chip and smartphone app that stores data about a person, a watch, and a security key.
It would act as a computerised method for storing and managing data associated with a user's timepiece. The application was filed with the Organisation Mondiale de la Propriété Intellectuelle in August.
“No brand needs a solution to track information about its watches and customers more than Rolex,” writes Rob Corder.
“Rolex makes the most traded watches in the world, they are also the most frequently stolen and the most counterfeited by criminal gangs, so considerable investment has gone into finding a solution to protect its watches, its customers and its reputation.”
This program would allow retailers and customers to access information via the Internet about specific watch data by scanning a card-based chip, using a smartphone camera, or scanning a QR code.
Corder added: “We hear little these days from the likes of Omega, Breitling, Louis Erard, Dubois et Fils, Panerai and Ressence, which have all experimented with blockchain-based authentication and tracking, but the challenge of instantly identifying whether a watch is genuine or fake, and gleaning information like who has bought and sold it, remains.”
According to research by The Watch Register, Rolex models account for more than 40 per cent of all luxury watch thefts.
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