Activate a tag
If you are holding a OneID tag, this is how it becomes yours. The whole thing takes about a minute.
Claiming
Five steps, once per tag
- 1
Scan the tag
Point your camera at the QR code or tap the tag against your phone. A page opens showing that this tag has not been claimed yet.
- 2
Sign in or create an account
Claiming binds the tag to you, so it needs an account. Creating one is free and takes an email address.
- 3
Enter the claim secret
Every tag ships with a secret — usually under a scratch panel or inside the packaging. It proves you physically have the tag rather than having seen it somewhere.
- 4
Bind it to something
Attach the tag to an identity you already have, or create one as you go: a pet, a vehicle, a bag, a card. That is the record a finder will reach.
- 5
Choose what a stranger sees
Field by field. Nothing is published until you say so, and anything you withhold is never sent to the page a finder opens.
Reading a tag
QR or NFC — whichever the tag is
A QR code
Open the camera and point it at the code. Every phone made in the last decade can read one without an app.
An NFC tag
Hold the top of your phone against it. If nothing happens, NFC may be off in settings — or use the QR code printed alongside it.
If it does not work
Common problems
- The page says the tag is already claimed
- Somebody has bound it already. If you bought it second-hand, the previous owner needs to transfer or release it — a claim secret alone cannot take a tag from somebody else, by design.
- The claim secret is not accepted
- Check for a mistyped character — the secret is case-sensitive. Repeated failures are rate-limited to stop somebody guessing their way onto your tag.
- Nothing happens when I tap
- NFC is switched off on many phones by default, and a metal surface behind the tag can stop it being read. The QR code works either way.
Tags are not on general sale yet
OneID is in development. Tags currently in circulation are from test batches issued directly to early users, and are labelled as test tags. Production manufacturing has not started.