Florida commits to bringing its state ID to Apple's Wallet app

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Wallet Ios
Wallet Ios (Image credit: Apple)

What you need to know

  • Florida is rolling out a new app that allows residents to store a digital version of their ID.
  • The state says it is working with Apple to bring its ID to the Wallet app as well.
  • Apple announced support for digital IDs at WWDC in June.

Florida might be one of the first states in the United States to support digital identification.

As reported by Florida Politics, the Florida Department of Highway Safety and Motor Vehicles has announced that residents could soon download a digital copy of their driver's license to an app as soon as next month.

In an update before a Senate panel Tuesday, FLHSMV officials said the Florida Smart-ID app is already live but not available to the public. The department is on schedule to put the digital ID public on the Apple App Store and Android Google Play store in mid-November.Senate Transportation Committee Chair Gayle Harrell called smartphones a marvelous tool for digital driver's licenses and other identifications. The state began the process to develop digital driver's licenses in 2014."We all have these instruments in our pockets," Harrell said. "They have become our way of life, our lifeline, truly, to the world."

FLHSMV motorist modernization director Terrence Samuel also revealed that the state is working with Apple to bring its digital IDs to the iPhone's Wallet app.

Florida was left off a recent list of states Apple is partnering with for Wallet digital IDs, concerning Harrell. Samuel was surprised the state wasn't on the list, but the department has now exchanged information with Apple in the hopes of getting added to the list of partners."There's nothing that we see that would prevent us from being on the list," Samuel said.

Apple announced that it was looking to bring IDs to the Wallet app at WWDC back in June. The move would allow people to store a digital version of their driver's license that could be used in place of a physical one. The company said that the TSA would be one of the first places to accept the digital ID and that states would be added one by one.

Joe Wituschek
Joe Wituschek
Contributor

Joe Wituschek is a Contributor at iMore. With over ten years in the technology industry, one of them being at Apple, Joe now covers the company for the website. In addition to covering breaking news, Joe also writes editorials and reviews for a range of products. He fell in love with Apple products when he got an iPod nano for Christmas almost twenty years ago. Despite being considered a "heavy" user, he has always preferred the consumer-focused products like the MacBook Air, iPad mini, and iPhone 13 mini. He will fight to the death to keep a mini iPhone in the lineup. In his free time, Joe enjoys video games, movies, photography, running, and basically everything outdoors.