Abstract: An automated membership system including (i) an article containing readable data to identify a user and (ii) a server for (a) storing the profile data of the user, the profile data including data representing a first identifier; (b) receiving from the user a request message identifying a vendor; (c) providing the user's profile data to the vendor, so as to enable the vendor to carry out a transaction with the user based on a second identifier; (d) storing the second identifier in association with the user's profile data, wherein the vendor accesses the second identifier based on a query including the first identifier read from the article, so as to enable the vendor to carry out a transaction with the user based on the second identifier.