Packaging goes digital: authentication and 2d barcodes take center stage

By early 2026, packaging has firmly established authentication as its third essential function alongside protection and branding, a transformation driven by the urgent need to combat sophisticated counterfeiting, grey market activity, and return fraud. Ashley Burkle highlights that embedding connected technologies such as Near Field Communication (NFC) into packaging empowers each product with a secure digital identity, turning what was once a disposable container into a continuous source of trusted information throughout the product lifecycle.

This evolution reflects the growing complexity of supply chains over the past five years, where overlapping risks like diversion and unauthorized resale exploit visibility gaps and threaten brand control. Burkle emphasizes that authentication now extends packaging’s role beyond mere physical protection to verifying product authenticity, detecting tampering, and instilling confidence among all stakeholders—from distributors to consumers—who rely on the integrity of the product experience.

Consequently, companies are reimagining packaging investment from a single-purpose cost into a multifunctional infrastructure that supports a broad spectrum of business needs. As Burkle notes, connected packaging not only authenticates products but also streamlines recalls, enhances traceability, facilitates digital product passports, and fosters direct consumer engagement, signaling a strategic shift where packaging becomes a foundational platform for trust and compliance in an increasingly complex marketplace.

By mid-2026, regulatory bodies like India's Union Health Ministry have significantly broadened traceability mandates, extending QR code and barcode requirements beyond the top 300 pharma brands to encompass four additional categories of life-saving drugs. This expansion reflects a global trend, as over 70 countries now recommend or require GS1 2D barcodes in healthcare regulations, underscoring widespread acceptance of standardized digital product identities to enhance supply chain safety and resilience.

Central to these regulatory advances are GS1 standards, which assign unique IDs to every product, shipment, and location, transforming each movement within the supply chain into a verifiable, scannable event. This uniform system not only facilitates end-to-end traceability but also lays the groundwork for integrated compliance ecosystems, such as India’s emerging pharma framework that links manufacturing, distribution, and patient care through a singular digital identity, thereby elevating traceability from a mere regulatory requirement to a foundational element of healthcare delivery.

By 2027, the retail industry is undertaking a significant technical shift from traditional UPC barcodes to standards-based two-dimensional barcodes such as QR Codes and GS1 DataMatrix, driven by the Sunrise 2027 initiative that mandates point-of-sale systems to process these advanced codes. This transition is far more than a simple packaging update; it demands precise product identifiers, adherence to data syntax standards, high-quality printing, and close coordination with retail partners to ensure seamless integration and compliance.

Two-dimensional barcodes represent a leap in data capacity and functionality, capable of encoding up to 3,000 digits and characters—vastly surpassing the limited information conveyed by one-dimensional barcodes. This enhanced capacity allows encoding of detailed product information such as batch and serial numbers, expiration dates, packaging time and location, and traceability records, transforming packaging into a rich source of operational and consumer data.

During this phased transition, packages often feature both traditional UPC and new 2D barcodes, reflecting a pragmatic approach that maintains legacy systems unless legal mandates require otherwise. This dual presence supports multiple simultaneous uses: retail identification, consumer engagement through smartphone access to brand-authorized content, and operational efficiencies like expiration management and recall handling, illustrating the multipurpose potential of standards-based 2D codes.

Ensuring the readability of 2D barcodes is a critical technical challenge that hinges on careful design choices regarding size, contrast, print quality, and placement. Codes must avoid problematic locations such as folds, seams, reflective surfaces, or curved packaging areas to guarantee scanner and smartphone compatibility, which is essential for unlocking the full benefits of these advanced codes, including improved inventory control and consumer interaction.

In August 2026, Markem-Imaje made a significant leap in connected packaging technology with the launch of its CoLOS 2D Activate and CoLOS 2D Engage SaaS platforms. These solutions offer manufacturers an end-to-end system to navigate the complexities of GS1 Sunrise 2027 compliance, from readiness assessments to generating and managing GS1 Digital Link QR codes. Beyond regulatory adherence, the platforms uniquely integrate enterprise data to enable dynamic consumer engagement, positioning Markem-Imaje as one of the first coding and marking suppliers to bridge the gap between compliance and marketing.