Marketplaces asked the Ministry of Digital Development to support the online sale of alcohol through biometrics

The resource points out that alcohol is the only product whose sale is prohibited on the Internet. At the same time, the ban is currently observed only by bona fide market participants, while shadow companies successfully circumvent it.

According to AKIT, illegal online alcohol sales in Russia reached 80 billion rubles in 2023, up 60% from the previous year. In 2024, this figure is expected to rise to 100 billion rubles. The letter also states that counterfeits account for 53% of online sales.

The Association proposes to allow remote sale of alcohol using the “Unified System for Identification and Authentication of Persons through Biometric Personal Data” (GIS EBS) to verify age. This solution could also help control alcohol purchases in the country.

To implement the idea, online platforms will need to be integrated with an identification system. ACIT therefore calls on the government to support the proposed approach, especially in light of the public debate on the possibility of using biometrics to identify customers.

Retail chains, which could lose a significant part of their revenue, opposed this idea. In addition, some market participants believe that the use of identification systems in the sale of alcohol will not solve the problem of counterfeit alcohol products, as they do not guarantee the presence of excise stamps on the product.

• In mid-September 2024, Sber and the Unified Biometric System (UBS) planned to start paying for goods marked as over 18 “by face” instead of presenting a passport. Irina Gushchina, a lawyer in the IP and IT transaction department at Semenov & Pevzner, noted that teenagers can still ask adults to make purchases for them, regardless of the age verification method.