# How it works

Two taps, and your customer knows the product is authentic.


Each of your products carries a TAGBASE tag, a small chip in the label or the
packaging. A customer holds a phone against it, taps once more when the page
asks, and finds out whether the product is authentic. They install nothing and
sign in to nothing. The whole check runs in the browser and takes a few seconds.

[Image: Two rows. In the real world a tagged item is tapped by a consumer phone, the phone asks TAGBASE Verify to check the tap, TAGBASE looks the tag up in its database and reads its history, and the verdict travels back to the phone. The trip runs twice: the first tap leaves the verification pending, shown as a yellow question mark, and the second tap proves the tag is live, shown as a green tick.. See the web version of this page.]

## What happens on each tap

**First tap.** The tag sends the phone to a page. TAGBASE looks the tag up,
records the tap, and asks for one more. Nothing is decided yet, and the page
says so.

**Second tap.** Now the tag proves itself. It sends a fresh answer that no copy
can produce, TAGBASE checks it against the first tap, and the page turns green.
That same page carries your own content: the product name, an image or a video,
your domain, and documents such as a warranty or a certificate. You choose what
goes on it in [verification page](/docs/team-and-settings/verification-page).

[Image: The verification page on a phone: product photo, tabs, and the green authentic-product result. See the web version of this page.]

## Why one tap is not enough

Some solutions on the market verify on a single tap. We do not think that is
safe. A single tap can be recorded and played back later, and a check that sees
only one tap cannot tell a recording from the authentic tag.

A genuine TAGBASE tag answers differently every time, and every answer carries
cryptographic proof that only that tag can produce. A copy has one recorded
answer and nothing else, so it never gets past the second tap. When your
customer sees the green result, the tag in their hand is the tag you sent out.

## What you get out of it

Your customer sees one page. You see every tap behind it. Each scan reaches your
dashboard as it happens, failed ones included, with the product, the result, and
where in the world the phone was. The
[verifications](/docs/dashboard/verifications) list and its live map show them
one at a time, and [statistics](/docs/dashboard/statistics) turn them into
trends by product, place, and time.

## Where to go next

- [Scanning a tag](/docs/getting-started/scanning-a-tag) walks through both taps
  on a real product.
- [Security model](/docs/overview/security) explains what we check on every tap
  and what we never trust.
- [Your first product](/docs/getting-started/your-first-product) takes you from
  a new account to your first verifiable product.