If you’ve ever been fooled into buying a counterfeit ticket, you’ll be glad to hear that better technology may reduce that risk. Following Sports Illustrated Tickets and Live Nation France, Walt Disney World's theme parks likely will adopt a new ticketing and admissions system described in its recent patent application.
Disney Enterprises Inc., a subsidiary of The Walt Disney Co. (NYSE: DIS) filed an application called “Systems and Methods to Produce a Physical Article that Provides Admission Authorization to an Event Which Correlates to a Digital Asset from a Temporary Wallet.”
That mouthful boils down to this: Real tickets are in, and fake tickets are out.
By tapping into the security offered by blockchain technology, which authenticates payments, the future Disney ticket will be digitally guaranteed. The terms of the ticketing transaction will be written directly into lines of code.
The data cannot be tampered with, which could give buyers confidence in the authenticity of their tickets.
According to the description of the technology included in the patent application, buyers will be able to print a physical version of the ticket.
Until the new ticketing tech is implemented, shoppers should be careful about buying Disney World tickets, advises Key to the World Travel, an authorized Disney vacation planner. The company's website includes a page with the most common ticket scams:
- The sale of partially used tickets — a problem because the new ticket holder’s fingerprints don’t match the original ticket holder’s
- The sale of military discount tickets — only valid for the original ticket holder with proper identification
- The sale of complementary cast member tickets — such tickets can be gifted but not sold
- The sale of Florida resident tickets to non-residents
- The sale of downright counterfeit tickets, which often look blurry or come from an unauthorized dealer
The new technology enabling the creation of immutably authentic tickets could put an end to the distribution of fake tickets. Representatives for Disney did not comment on the patent application or a timeline for implementation.
Walt Disney World has nearly 75,000 Orlando workers, and its four local theme parks — Magic Kingdom, Epcot, Animal Kingdom and Hollywood Studios — are among Central Florida's largest tourist attractions. Walt Disney World alone is the top generator of visitors to Orlando, with more than 47 million people going through its turnstiles in previous years — many of those repeat visitors.
Disney also owns two area water parks, Blizzard Beach and Typhoon Lagoon, as well as several themed hotels, golf courses, a camping resort, timeshare properties, a residential community called Golden Oak at Walt Disney World Resort, ESPN Wide World of Sports and the Disney Springs entertainment, dining and shopping complex.
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