As part of their “Payez Mobile” trial for contactless mobile payment, five major French banks are using Gemalto’s Allynis service offer. The banks are BNP Paribas, Credit Agricole-LCL, Credit Mutuel-CIC, Caisse d'Epargne and La Banque Postale Groups.

New York Times Technology Columnist David Pogue wrote a column about smart cards and the potential future of identification and payments. Pogue chatted with Randy Vanderhoof, executive director of the Smart Card Alliance for the column. Pogue was the keynote speaker at the 18th Annual CTST Conference this past May in Orlando, Fla.

Card solutions provider SOLIATIS has launched SOLIATIS LAB, testing laboratory able to perform debugging sessions as well as certification reports for smart cards and readers in contact and contactless technologies.

A new cooperative agreement between the GSM Association (GSMA), which brings together the world’s major mobile operators, and the European Payment Council (EPC), which the EU banking sector, could speed the adoption of mobile phone payments, or near field communication, across Europe and the world.

Visa has announced new global specifications for its payWave platform based on based on the international EMV standard. The company says the new global spec, called Visa Contactless 2.0, will ensure customers can use their contactless cards worldwide, while still offering the flexibility for customization to meet local market needs.

Plastic card manufacturer CPI Card Group, Littleton, Colo. recently announced two organizational changes to aid in its shift to a strategic initiative focusing on color technology as a core competency of the company.

Ken Keith, who has been instrumental in leading CPI's Fort Wayne manufacturing operation this past year through tremendous growth, has been promoted to director of color technology, while Gene Fogle will bring his more than 20 years' plant management experience to CPI's Indiana operation as the company's new manufacturing director.

One of the largest luxury hotel operators in the Middle East and a small hotel in West Kent, England, have selected Oiartzun, Spain-based Salto access control technology to secure their guest rooms.

Both the Ebla Cham Palace, a 500-room, five-star hotel in Syria, and the 10-room Brew House Hotel in Royal Tunbridge Wells, West Kent, England, made use of Salto's XS4 access control system and contactless technology to provide wireless door lock capabilities.

WhizzGo is a pay-as-you-go car sharing service that operates around the UK and pulled into Birmingham earlier this year, according to a Birmingham Mail story. As gas prices rise these sharing services as becoming more popular as people get rid of their cars.

The club issues participants smart cards and PINs which they use to make reservations online and gain access to cars. Once a member makes the reservation online they go to the location to pick up the car. They hold the card over a reader on the windshield that unlocks the car. Once inside a PIN is entered to access the car keys.

SCM Microsystems has introduced a contactless version of its CHIPDRIVE time recording solution for small and medium sized businesses. Employees can use the system to clock-in, clock-out and record time spent on specific projects with a touch of the CHIPDRIVE user chip token to the time recording terminal, eliminating the need to carry and swipe time cards.

The transit authority for New Zealand’s densest metropolitan area has prioritized the design and construction of a smart card ticketing system. According to a recently released plan of passenger transit project for 2008-2009, the Auckland Regional Transport Authority (ARTA) has placed smart cards at the top of its plans.

The British payment association APACS reports that while opportunities to use a contactless payment option are on the rise in the UK, the average citizen has been slow to take advantage.

British banks introduced contactless payment in September of 2007, but they have issued only 340,000 contactless banking cards through the end of May 2008. In April of this year merchants deployed 6,200 contactless point-of-sale terminals, but only about 15,000 contactless transactions took place.

At least 12 states have passed legislation saying they won't comply with Real ID, the federal mandate to secure state-issues IDs and driver licenses. Lawmakers in Main have been particularly outspoken regarding the law. Regarding ID Editor Zack Martin speaks with Maine State Sen. Phil Bartlett about the law and why the state has some concerns.

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INSIDE Contactless has added Samsung Ventures America to its list of investors, which now includes the world’s top three handset manufacturers. Samsung Ventures joins Nokia Growth Partners and Motorola Ventures, along with other institutional investors, to provide nearly $42 million to enable the company to accelerate its international presence and broaden its product portfolio.

GlobalPlatform, the smart card specification organization, has published a test plan which can be used by vendors and deployers of smart card devices and to self-test their product to ensure it complies with the latest release of GlobalPlatform device technology – GPD/STIP v2.3* – before development and implementation.

Vendors can use the new test plan to make sure products comply with the specification. This may result in quicker time to market.

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Altair Financial Services, a U.K. prepaid card provider, has launched a wrist watch featuring MasterCard's PayPass contactless payments technology. The vendor teamed with RFID specialist CardPOS Europe, smart card maker ID Data and watch maker Laks to create the watch.

Working toward its goal of leading NFC adoption in the U.K., O2 is conducting trials of NFC technology in the health care and entertainment sectors.

O2 is testing NFC technology to protect visiting health care workers in the field. It has equipped 120 health care workers with NFC handsets for remote community care access. Workers can access patient records on their handsets and log their whereabouts when they are visiting patients to increase their safety while making house calls.

Cardz Middle East, a United Arab Emirates card management solutions provider specializing in digital photo ID card management systems, is launching a Mifare-based bus pass system that's initially targeted to students in the Indian state of Karnataka.

Prior to the new system, students would identify themselves with their school or college identity card and be given concession tickets via a manual ticketing system. With the Mifare system, a personalized card will be given to each student. When the card is brought within range of the electronic ticketing machine , a bus pass is automatically generated.

Atos Origin and Sagem Securite will implement the issuance of France’s biometric electronic passport, according to a VNU Net article.

The two companies will deploy 5,000 data acquisition and processing systems to 2,350 government offices by next June. The new travel documents will include fingerprints and a photograph that will be stores on a contactless smart card chip on the document. ANTS, France’s national secure credentials agency, is managing the project.

Read the full story here.

Taking aim at cash transactions for less than £10 - a market in the UK estimated at 20 billion transactions a year - the transaction management company The Logic Group has introduced a new contactless payments solution. The product is designed to enable retailers to introduce contactless card payment that offer more convenience, security and speed than cash, while offering more flexibility to retailers than current bank-sponsored options.

Consumer concern over the security of their contactless smart card-enabled IDs and credit cards may be growing. That is one explanation for the news from security product maker Identity Stronghold that the company has shipped its one-millionth contactless smart card security product as of June 2008.

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Certain types of radio frequency identification tags can cause electromagnetic interference with medical equipment, according to a report in the Journal of the American Medical Association. The report cautions facilities to check for interference from an RFID system before deploying it.

The study examined the impact of 125-kHz and 868-MHz frequencies on medical equipment. The 125-kHz is the technology used in proximity cards while the 868-MHz is a long-range RFID tag. Contactless smart cards, which use the 13.56 MHz, were not mentioned in the report.

A coalition of consumer groups, including members of the Consumer Federation of America, Consumer Action and Consumers Union (the nonprofit publisher of Consumer Reports magazine), are urging caution as contactless payment technology is adopted. The group’s concerns are voiced in comments submitted to the FTC on Friday, in preparation for a town hall meeting on the subject scheduled for July 24 in Seattle.

SmartCentric Technologies International Ltd. has announced that John K. Brueck Jr. has joined SmartCentric Technologies US LLC as regional sales manager of North America.

Brueck will focus on expanding sales in the campus market. Previously he was director of Campus Card Services at Nova Southeastern University from 2003-2006. He joins SmartCentric at a time when demand for contactless card solutions using smart technologies is rapidly increasing.

MasterCard has reached an agreement with Obopay Inc. to offer an on-demand person-to-person mobile payment service in the United States. The service, offered via MasterCard MoneySend, will enable MasterCard issuers to provide a mobile payments service to their MasterCard cardholders on all credit, debit and prepaid MasterCard-branded products.

The new Mobile MasterCard MoneySend Person-to-Person service will enable participants to send and receive funds through any registered cardholder’s mobile phone. Participants will use mobile numbers to send and receive funds, keeping their payment account numbers private.

Ingenico has announced that its i3070 Contactless PINpad has been approved by both Mastercard PayPass and Visa payWave. The company notes that this gives their pinpad a unique flexibility, as it is the first such device on the market that can read magnetic stripe cards, smartcards, contactless cards and NFC phones.

The i3070 Contactless can be connected to most Ingenico terminals or sale systems via one cable. The device is PCI-PED-compliant and supports the latest and most stringent payment requirements from MasterCard and Visa, including EMV Contactless and mobile phone payments

Released in early June, the Homeland Security Presidential Directive 24 (HSPD-24) mandates that U.S. government agencies use a standardized approach in the "collection, storage, use, analysis, and sharing of biometric and associated biographic and contextual information of individuals." The stated goal is to better enable cross-agency sharing of biometric data to identify known and suspected terrorists (KSTs). Host Chris Corum discusses the implications of the new directive with the International Biometric Industry Association's Walter Hamilton.

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In order to better protect information stored on smart cards, NLnet Foundation is giving Radboud University in Nijmegen, Netherlands more than $200,000 to develop an open source software model for the microprocessor cards, according to Computerworld UK.

The plan is to publish the code and research for peer review. Companies will then be able to license the products under the GNU General Public License.

A Southeastern Pennsylvania Transportation Administration (SEPTA) official announced that a new automated fare collection system will likely include contactless cards and will start being built into the transit system in spring 2009.

The new technology will push back the contract award announcement. SEPTA officials have met with vendors the past two months discussing their knowledge and experience, but they will not accept proposals from any company to install the new collection system until October according to SEPTA revenue and ridership chief John McGee.

One major factor in the new SEPTA system will be the goal of having a system that accepts payment and is compatible with other transit systems in surrounding areas like PATCO and NJ Transit.The contract is expected to be awarded in 2009.

Identification Technology Partners (IDTP) has received a Small Business Achievement Award for Outstanding Performance at the Department of Homeland Security's 4^th Annual Small Business Awards Ceremony. IDTP was nominated for the award by the Transportation Security Administration for outstanding performance in support of TSA's secure credentialing programs.

IDTP is providing ongoing technical support to TSA within the Transportation Threat and Credentialing Office's maritime and aviation credentialing programs. IDTP has worked with TSA since 2003 to provide smart card and biometrics technology expertise to the Transportation Worker Identification Credential program office. More recently, IDTP has also been tasked to support the Registered Traveler (RT) and Aviation Credential Interoperability Solution programs.

IDTP provides core technical and management services for the programs, systems and standards that are being developed around secure identity authentication.

The 2012 Summer Olympics in London will be cash free if Visa has anything to say about it, according to the UK’s Evening Standard. Visa plans to issue thousands of the contactless smart cards and readers before the event. Tickets may even be stored on the cards.

Read the full story here.

Neowave has introduced a new kind of smart card for mass-transit riders. The Weneo PASS Smart Objects not only has the standard contactless smart card interface used by transit operators, but also features flash memory drive.

The Smart Object can also be personalized with a photo of the owner. The device also can connect to a users PC, which enables the owner to Web reload tickets, update rights and personal data. The drive also includes personal productivity tools.

The Washington Metropolitan Tranist Authority is making it easier for senior citizens 65 and older to get their discount when riding Metrobus and Metrorail with the new senior SmarTrip cards that will be available July 1.

The new senior SmarTrip card is bright yellow, which makes it easy to identify as a reduced fare SmarTrip card. Reduced fare is automatically deducted from the card. To get the senior SmarTrip card, senior citizens must show proof of age such as a valid driver license, government-issued photo ID or passport with date of birth.

Senior SmarTrip cards will be available for purchase at all Metro sales outlets, regional commuter stores and public libraries in Prince George’s and Montgomery counties. Once customers purchase a senior SmarTrip card for $5, they can add value to the card at any Metrorail station and on any Metrobus.

The ERG Group has signed a contract with Utah Transit Authority to further develop and implement a contactless fare payment solution, which will include acceptance of contactless credit cards. The contract for the full system to be implemented comes after the successful pilot project completed by ERG and UTA.

In the pilot, buses serving Salt Lake City area ski resorts were equipped with the new system, which, in addition to the payment choice of contactless credit cards, enabled customers to use smart cards for both transit payment and ski resort access.

ERG’s solution will allow a variety of cards to be used for fare payment including UTA issued employer provided transit smart cards, local university passes, ski resort passes and contactless credit cards.

Development and deployment of the system will be a collaborative effort between ERG and UTA, with integration of UTA’s existing on-board equipment and ERG’s software and hardware.

Transport for London has responded to claims made by Dutch security researchers that the Oyster card is not secure and can be hacked and cloned easily.

ZDNet has the following statement from TfL' regarding the matter:

"Londoners can have total confidence in the security of their Oyster cards. We run daily tests for cloned or fraudulent cards and any found would be stopped within 24 hours of being discovered. Therefore the most anyone could gain from a rogue card is one day's travel. Security is the key aspect of the Oyster system and Londoners can have confidence in the security of their Oyster cards. Using a fraudulent card for free travel is subject to prosecution."

TranSys - the consortium responsible for delivering Oyster on behalf of TfL also commented to ZDNet:

"Oyster has been designed with security at the forefront of its functionality. It has robust security, which operates at different points within the system. This ensures that should one security measure be breached, another will protect Oyster cards and the system as a whole. No personal information is stored on an Oyster card and specific information relating to the individual card holder (name, address, telephone etc) is stored on a central database and kept separate from journey data."

Read the full story here.

NXP Semiconductors has been ranked at the top of the latest Vendor Matrix released by ABI Research.

Inside Contactless and Infineon Technologies claimed the second and third spots in the company’s most recent evaluation of worldwide contactless IC vendors.

The Vendor Matrix is an analytical tool developed by ABI Research to provide a clear understanding of vendors’ positions in specific markets. In this Vendor Matrix, the focus is specifically on ICs developed for and delivered to the contactless payment, ticketing and NFC markets.

Hong Kong-based Advanced Card Systems Ltd. provided two days of Smart Card Technology Training to students at the Information Technology Services Centre of The Chinese University of Hong Kong. The training took place at the headquarter of ACS, and ACS’ Chief Technical Officer, Keng Boon Tan was the trainer.

The university, founded in 1963, has more than 10-year of experience using contact smart card applications for identification, access control, administrative transactions as well as storing tokens for on-campus facilities. The university is now exploring the contactless smart card technology to further improve and enhance the services. ACS’s training provided students with an in-depth training on contactless smart card technology and application, with an emphasis on system design of multi-application campus card. Every attendant was provided with software development kit.

GE Security Inc. announced the expansion of its Transition card reader series with three new Personal Identity Verification readers: the T-500-PIV, T-520-PIV and T-525-PIV. The readers are designed to help customers meet the PIV requirements mandated by HSPD-12 and enable customers to transition from their current access credential to the new PIV credential.

The new GE Security PIV readers have the ability to read multiple access credential formats. Approved by the U.S. government as FIPS 201-compliant PIV transparent readers. Like other readers in the Transition Series, these readers feature technology that adjusts to a wide range of installation mounting surfaces. They are available with or without keypads and offer mullion mount, mid-range and mid-range with keypad options. Their appearance also matches other Transition Series readers for a uniform presentation throughout the installation.

Is the wallet you're carrying in your back pocket or handbag today getting too bulky? StarHub, Singapore's second largest info-communications provider, thinks so. The company has signed a Memorandum of Understanding with NTT DOCOMO, one of Japan's mobile communications provider, to explore a mobile wallet concept similar to Japan's Osaifu-Keitai wallet solution for a near future implementation in Singapore.

Osaifu-Keitai means "mobile wallet" in Japanese. It is a trademark of NTT DOCOMO, which launched this service in July 2004, whereby the mobile phone is integrated with a contactless chip to offer mobile payment and transaction services, including the ability to have the phone act as an identity card, fare card for bus and train rides, and a credit and loyalty card. This mobile wallet application is also supported by other mobile service providers and accepted at more than 640,000 stores, making it the standard for mobile wallet services in Japan.

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A study by Chinese research and consulting firm, CCID, suggests that smart card sales in China are down slightly compared to last year. But it is another detail in the report's summary that is equally interesting. It shows the market share of smart card sales in the country by vendor as follows:

• Gemalto - 20.3%


• Eastcom Peace - 15.5%


• Da Tang - 13.7%


• Watchdata - 10.5%


• G&D - 8.6%

Crossing the borders between Qatar and Saudi Arabia can now be done with a smart card rather than a passport. The two countries agreed to accept the national ID cards for passage in an effort to facilitate travel and commerce.

All members of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) – Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, Oman, Kuwait and the UAE – have agreed to eliminate the passport in favor of the smart ID card. The Qatar cards are provided by Gemalto and contain both contact and contactless technology. Other vendors on the project include Daon and BellID. Read more at Gulf Times.

Contactless payment cards will continue to be deployed in the UK, according to payment association APACS.

There are 337,000 cards enabled for contactless technology in the UK, according to a story in IT Pro. Most of the cards are in London and the South East where Barclaycard, Visa and Transport for London have held trials. Some 6,000 merchants now have contactless-enabled point-of-sales terminals as well. Near field communication is also on the horizon, the story posited.

Read the full story here.

Tyfone is attending FSTC (Financial Services Technology Consortium) 2008 Annual Conference, which starts today and runs through June 19^th in Santa Rosa, California.

Throughout the show, Tyfone will demonstrate its Mobile Financial Services Platform consisting of a mobile banking software suite along with the company's mobile payments technology.

The company has come up with a different way of enabling mobile payments. Instead of waiting for the handset manufacturers to release devices, Tyfone enables memory card-enabled phones to become capable of contactless payments. With security features implemented directly on the memory card, financial institutions and their customers are not tied to a mobile payments model that relies on a single carrier and a limited selection of handset models.

An automated fare collection system is being contemplated by the transportation agency in Vancouver, British Columbia. The minister of transportation, Kevin Falcon, said he wants the system up and running as soon as possible because it will help block people from riding unauthorized and unpaid as well as make the transit system safer.

He is shooting for a launch in 2010, but TransLink, the organization responsible for the regional transportation network in Vancouver, may proceed cautiously. They are planning a smart card system that could be close to completed by 2010, but they don't feel that it will officially launch that soon. Systems throughout the world on average take around six years to complete, from when they get the green light to start the project to the time it was actually operational. One advantage for TransLink is that they have been following smart card-using systems throughout the world and will be hopefully be able to avoid some of the problems that current systems have had.

Read the full story here.

Airport workers and air carrier employees require access to secure areas in sensitive airport locations. Currently there is no standard for a strong authentication credential to identify these workers as they move within and between airports. The Transportation Security Administration is investigating such a credential through its Aviation Credential Interoperability Solution (ACIS). Avisian Publishing's Chris Corum and the TSA's ACIS Program Manager Chris Runde provide insight into the potential biometric solution in this edition of the re:ID Podcast.

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The public transport authority of the Frankfurt Rhein-Main region (RMV), T-Systems, Nokia and Venyon have announced the next phase for RMV mobile ticketing at the international NFC Forum meeting in Frankfurt am Main in Germany. The new mobile ticketing solution based on Near Field Communication will offer a wider variety of mobile tickets.

RMV introduced its mobile ticketing scheme in 2006. The main target of this new enhancement to the ticketing solution is to enable customers to purchase mobile tickets even more spontaneously and easily. The ticket will now be stored in the embedded secure element of the NFC-enabled mobile phone, and can be inspected just by holding the device close to the inspector’s reading device, which checks the validity of the ticket. This takes only a few milliseconds without any further interaction from the customer.

Blaze mobile is offering subscribers the ability to make payments and check their bank account with their mobile phones, according to WalletPop.com. The contactless payments are compatible with the MasterCard PayPass payment systems. Blaze charges $5 per month for the feature and $20 for the contactless payment sticker.

Read the full story here.

Digital security provider Gemalto has to date supplied more than a million student ID cards to some 100 universities and high schools in Poland. The company provided the cards to OPTeam, a Gemalto value added reseller, which then personalized the cards for the colleges and schools. Large-scale deployment started last fall and another 300 universities are expected to join the program soon.

DataCash Group has completed the purchase of ACK Ltd, a provider of card-processing software solutions. The international card-processing company said the total purchase price for ACK Ltd. will be approximately 3 million GBP.

DataCash indicated that the purchase of ACK Ltd. will accelerate the company’s move to provide a full service offering for markets using unattended and contactless payments including solutions for kiosk operators, vending service providers and ticketing operations. The merger will also extend its ability to process the card payments of UK and Republic of Ireland based retailers

Officials in Vancouver, British Columbia, have initiated a project to bring smart cards to the area’s Translink mass transit system. A preliminary call for advice to help shape the project was issued in April, and officials hope the system will be in place within the next six years at a cost of around $125 million.

The Translink system covers several types of transportation, including the SkyTrain rail system, buses, and SeaBuses. Smart cards will enable passengers to use all types of transit under one fare system, and pay based on actual distance traveled, rather than the current system which uses a set of boundaries throughout the metropolitan area to determine fees.

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Samsung Electronics Co. Ltd. has announced its 90-nanometer smart card IC with high-data storage capacity for subscriber identity module cards and mobile TV applications.

The new 90nm smart card IC uses a Samsung proprietary 16-bit CalmRISC processor with 16.5KB RAM, 384KB ROM, and a large capacity 288KB EEPROM. Samsung will unveil a flash memory version of the chip by the end of the year.

The new smart card IC uses an accelerator processor and on-chip support for symmetrical encryption/decryption standards, an asymmetrical encryption standard and an elliptic curve crypto algorithm to provide users with security support, shortening user verification time and reinforcing protection against forgery or hacking.

Market research group Business Insights has made available a new report examining the future of the payment industry as it moves toward the long-awaited “cashless” society. The report considers the current global market for payments technologies and provides an analysis of how the sector could evolve.

Among the areas examined are the security issues surrounding contactless payments, and what makes this type of transaction appealing to both merchants and consumers, with a focus on the benefits of contactless payments’ speed. The report also outlines what Business Insights’ analysts believe is needed to further the success of contactless payments.

For more information go here.

Dynamic Card Solutions (DCS), developer of the instant issue and PIN selection software application CardWizard, has announced a partnership with Collis, a provider of transaction-processing and testing services. The companies will collaborate to offer an EMV Personalization Validation Tool (Collis EMV PVT) that analyzes, verifies and validates each CardWizard software script before it is used by a customer to instantly issue EMV and contactless payment cards.

The Collis EMV PVT is a test tool designed to read any EMV card to validate the personalized card data and cryptography against EMVCo, Visa, MasterCard and JCB specifications. The Collis EMV PVT guarantees that DCS' application has personalized the cards according to relevant specifications before going live with an instant issue program.

Datacard Group has sold its twenty-second Datacard Maxsys card issuance system in the Republic of Korea. This includes several multiple orders and repeat buyers, including BC Card, Shinhan Card, IC Korea, Hyundai Card, KB Card, Lotte Card and KBC.

The launch of the Maxsys system in South Korea also coincided with new EMV migration requirements. BC Card, a credit card issuer headquartered in Seoul, saw a significant rise in demand for these types of jobs — for which the Maxsys system is suited.

“The big advantages of the Maxsys system are high throughput, efficiency and a relatively compact footprint,” said Lee Hyun-Ho, General Manager at BC Card.

MDI Inc. will provide HSPD-12 compliant systems for new government offices in Washington DC. The project will consolidate 1,500 government employees from 5 separate operating locations into a central office building in downtown Washington.

Hardware and software products manufactured by MDI Security Systems will secure the new offices. These FIPS 201 compliant security products will be deployed and maintained by MDI Professional Services Group. The first phase of the project will be staged and executed over the next thirty to sixty days.

Confidex has announced that it has shipped more than 1 million limited-use Contactless PET RFID tickets in support of a new public transit ticketing system in Istanbul, Turkey. The tickets will be used as "5 in 1" single passenger tickets that will replace conventional paper tickets and augment the existing electronic ticketing system.

The tickets were purchased by Belbim A.S., through a contract with smart card technology provider PLASTKART. Belbim A.S. is a Turkish company that designs and develops computer systems and software, and provides consulting services to the Metropolitan Municipality of Istanbul, including the city's electronic transit fare and collection systems.

The mass transit system in Istanbul includes a mix of bus, rail and watercraft operated by the city, state and a number of private companies. Millions of passengers utilize the public transit service each day and Istanbul officials are investing heavily in an effort to modernize and increase the usage of public transportation options, while reducing vehicle congestion.

Effective June 10th, Oberthur Card Systems of America Corp. became Obertheur Technologies of America Corp. The change reflects both a need for continuity with its parent company, which became Oberthur Technologies SA last year, and an expansion of the company’s business focus beyond card systems.

In the last year, Oberthur has expanded its scope to include passports and other identity products beyond its traditional card business. The new name emphasizes the range of options it presents its clients in the identity market.

Yubico CEO and founder Stina Ehrensvärd talks with host Ryan Kline about the Yubikey, a new authentication solution, designed for web 2.0 applications. It works by having the user insert it in any computer with a USB port on any platform or browser without having to install any client software. The user then presses the YubiKey button to generate a one time passcode. Listen as they sidcuss topics about the Yubikey such as cost, implementations and the open source nature of the device.

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ASK has joined the UK-based Integrated Transport Smartcard Organization (ITSO) and successfully passed the ITSO certification. This certificate strengthens ASK market presence in the United Kingdom and confirms the company’s strategy to offer clients and partners a portfolio of products compliant with international and regional standards.

ITSO contactless smart cards have been implemented in more than nine areas in the United Kingdom including the Greater Manchester and Merseyside regions. ITSO is a non-profit sharing organization owned by its members and supported by the UK department for transport. The system covers all components: cards, points of service and back office systems.

ASK invented and developed one of the first contactless paper ticket in the world, C.ticket, which has been used by more than 85 million passengers including the 14 million Beijing Olympic Games visitors.

Telecom operator Etisalat and financial institution Emirates NBD will test payment applications with NFC-enabled phones in the United Arab Emirates, according to reports in The National

The two companies will select certain customers for the trial who will be issued NFC-enabled handsets. If the trial goes well and handsets are made available Etisalat is considering subsidizing the price of these phones. Emirates NBD and Etisalat are also planning on partnering with merchants to get additional contactless terminals in the field. The two organizations have not set a time frame for the pilot program.

Read the full story here.

The NFC Forum is holding its first Spotlight conference for an afternoon of discussions and demonstrations of NFC transport and city life applications in LivingXXL restaurant in Frankfurt's Eurotower. The program features presentations by NFC Forum Vice Chairman Gerhard Romen of Nokia, Dr. Wolf Heine of T-Systems and other representatives of organizations that have deployed NFC projects around the world.

The NFC Forum Spotlight: Transport and City Life conference gives organizations that are involved in NFC projects an opportunity to showcase solutions, share deployment experiences and identify best practices. More than 60 NFC transport and city life projects are now underway worldwide, enabling consumers to purchase public transport tickets, pay for parking, obtain municipal and tourist information, buy products and perform other transactions using their NFC-enabled mobile phones.

VingCard, a hospitality security provider and part of the ASSA ABLOY Hospitality Group, announced that Signature RFID by VingCard, featuring Near Field Communications cell phone compatibility, will be exhibited in Guestroom 2010 at HITEC 2008, June 17-19 in Austin, Texas.

Signature RFID/NFC is a system that enables hoteliers to offer contactless locks to guests. The locks operate on an open-platform system compatible with ISO 14443A/MIFARE, ISO 14443B,ISO 15693, and also the NFC secure transaction platform, which enables hotel guests to use NFC-enabled cell phones in lieu of keys or keycards.

Innovision has announced new low-cost NFC tags designed for integration into smart objects.

The new tags have additional memory size increasing from 96Bytes up to 512Bytes and it now offers faster read/write/test operation speeds. These meet or exceed the data storage requirements for all anticipated non-payment NFC applications, including peer-to-peer connectivity, service initiation and Smart Posters. These larger memories will also allow developers to use digital signatures for more secure NFC applications.

Frost & Sullivan's Smart Card and Auto ID Practice in Asia Pacific will host an analyst briefing on smart card mass transit and payment application in the Asia Pacific on June 18th 2008, at 11:00 hrs Singapore time.

Both contactless payment and mass transit applications have become popular in Asia Pacific. Frost & Sullivan think the two are headed for a common platform

NBS has announced its new remote/branch issuance software Xpressi. The software package enables remote/branch issuance of EMV compliant cards.

Developed by NBS' software division, UbiQ, Xpressi is a way to ensure remote/branch issuance of secure, EMV contact or contactless cards. The primary driving force behind EMV migration was the elimination of credit/debit card fraud. The EMV standards address the fraud issue, but the dilemma had been issuing cards to customer in a timely manner. Xpressi software along with card printers from NBS delivers compliant cards at the branch level - security centrally managed and cards locally produced.

Coffee giant Starbucks has indicated that cash may soon go the way of yesterday’s soggy grounds. Joining the growing list of major retailers in Asia accepting contactless transactions, the company has announced it will accept Visa payWave at its South Korean locations.

To explain the move, representatives of Starbucks and Visa point to the convenience faster transactions – their average cash transaction takes 12 to 14 seconds, compared to as little as four to six a Visa payWave payment – offers their customers.

As mobile phone manufacturers look to the emerging markets of nations like China and India to boost sales, they are discovering a tech-savvy consumer base that demands both advanced features in their phones and an affordable price. For makers targeting Asian consumers, low-priced NFC-enabled phones are a must, as experts predict Asia will be the take-off point for the technology.

Instead of the features-laden phones sold in the developed world at high price points, manufacturers are looking at mix-and-match packages for phones, cherry-picking popular features to create distinctive phones without upping prices. Pressure is also on semiconductor manufacturers to pack more components within chips, which reduces demands on a phone’s internal real estate and lowers supply chain complexity, and ultimately lowers costs for device manufacturers.

EONCAP Islamic Bank, a subsidiary of EON Bank Bhd, has unveiled the first Islamic debit card offering a contactless payment option. The bank plans to issue 70,000 of the cards in Malaysia in the next year.

While the card will be marketed to both Muslim and non-Muslim clients, it is meant to have special appeal to strict followers of Islam. The card follows Syariah principles, and therefore cannot be used in purchases involving alcohol or gambling.

The debit MasterCard is PayPass-enabled and is embedded with an EMV chip. It can be used globally in more than 26 million locations and can also function as an ATM card.

Brasil Telecom selected Gemalto to provide USIM cards for the launch of its 3G network this month. The USIM technology along with software adapted for 3G networks and loaded into the cards will enable Brasil Telecom’s users to access value-added services and benefit from higher levels of security on electronic transactions performed with their mobile devices.

The USIM cards provide mutual authentication between the user and the network, which enables mobile Internet users to perform transactions in a safer manner. Benefits are that voice and data traffic is encrypted in the 3G network, especially important for financial transactions and corporate activities.

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iDTRONIC has introduced two versions of a new RFID industrial reader/writer called Bluebox, capable of reading and writing LF and HF tags in harsh industrial environments. The devices are resistant to temperatures up to 55 degrees Celsius and are completely sealed against moisture and dust.

The 125 kHz version of the Bluebox reader/writer supports all EM 4100, 4550, NXP Hitag 1/S and Atmel Temic 5567 tags and is available with 5 different external antennas. The ISO 15693 version of the new Industrial Reader/Writer supports ISO15693, ISO14443A/B and the MIFARE family of tags, and is available with two different external antennas.

The Bluebox is able to store up to 30,000 tags which can be preprogrammed to customer requirements, and is capable of accurate readings in high tag density environments.

As ContactlessNews reported last week, SCM Microsystems has entered into a Memorandum of Understanding with Sony Corporation to develop and supply FeliCa contactless card readers for international markets. SCM officials now say that the Sony deal is a major step in a new strategy to focus on the fast growing contactless technology market.

The Sony agreement is a significant opportunity for SCM to gain a foothold in NFC distribution, given Sony’s status as a major player in the large Japanese NFC market, the company states. There are more than 250 million electronic payment cards and FeliCa-enabled mobile phones in circulation in Japan, making it the most developed contactless market in the world.

VeriFone Holdings Inc. has announced a new market initiative in its European, Middle East and African operations. The company will reorganize its management team and sales and marketing efforts into two market-focused teams, one focused on continental Europe and the other focused on Northern Europe, the Middle East and Africa.

One team will be headed by a longtime VeriFone executive, the other by a newcomer to the organization. Nigel Bidmead, part of VeriFone’s management team since it split from Hewlett-Packard, will be managing director for Northern Europe, the Middle East and Africa. Yolanda Rousselet will be responsible for VeriFone activities in continental Europe, including Russia. Rousselet is the former head of international sales for Sagem Monetel, now a subsidiary of Ingenico. Rousselet also has held several management positions with subsidiaries of Ingenico.

Didier Printing Company will now be known as CPI Card Group – Indiana. CPI acquired Didier Printing in January 2008, and the name change reflects the integration of the two companies.

The combined business has three manufacturing sites in Colorado, Nevada, and Indiana. The company also has the largest smart card production capacity in the industry. The combined facilities will provide increased flexibility for customers' plastic card needs, utilizing the best practices forged by each company's extensive industry experience.

Each of the three locations will maintain its unique focus in the marketplace. CPI – Indiana is focused on the short-run secure card market. CPI – Colorado specializes in high volume secure card orders. CPI – Nevada manufactures all general-purpose plastic.

U.S. Bank customers in Colorado, Utah, Missouri, and California will now be issued debit cards with the Visa payWave contactless payment feature. Visa payWave technology enables customers to make a purchase by simply holding their card within two inches of a secure reader instead of swiping it.

U.S. Bank customers in Denver and Salt Lake City who already hold a debit card can request a new card with Visa payWave functionality; some customers in California and Missouri received an automatic upgrade to the new card. The new cards carry the same zero liability protection and have the same fraud monitoring U.S. Bank offers with all debit cards.

In addition to merchants who allow payWave payments, U.S. Bank is working with USA Technologies to install 400 contactless vending machines in the Denver area, to provide customers with more places to use their new contactless card.

The Chinese Olympic Committee has offered more details about the RFID-enabled tickets being issued for the Beijing Olympics this summer. All tickets to the opening and closing ceremonies will include RFID tags containing personal information about the ticket holder, including passport information and home and e-mail addresses.

The information is included in an attempt to thwart counterfeiting of the tickets, which have a face value of $720. But the tickets raise concern among security experts, who theorize that an extremely secure RFID system to handle the tickets could cause serious tie-ups at the gates, while a lax security system would make ticket holders’ personal data easy prey to hackers. Officials say the Games' security team will employ an IT team of at least 4,000 experts with 1,000 servers at their disposal, testing the system for the next two months.

Officials originally planned to embed RFID tags in all 6.8 million tickets issued for Olympics events. These plans apparently went by the wayside, along with a plan to include place a photo of each ticket holder on their ticket. The RFID tags will only be in tickets for the opening and closing events, and photos of the tickets released to the press show no photos on them.

A new Holiday Inn Express Hotel and Suites in Halifax, Nova Scotia, chose to a contactless lock system for its guest rooms. The hotel placed the ILCO 790 contactless lock on its 119 guest rooms, along with its business center, pool, and other common areas.

Additionally, the hotel uses ILCO's stand-alone next generation front desk unit. It encodes key cards, tracks system and access control data, programs locks and manages and audits locks.

The ILCO systems have offered a number of benefits for the hotel management. The ease of use for guests is an improvement over key cards, which require specific alignments with the lock mechanism. Management can also audit locks easily, tracking employee movement with the hotel.

Promoting flexibility, quality and cost-effective production, printer manufacturer Atlantic Zeiser introduced three new printing solutions at drupa 2008, a once-every-four-year conference at Dusseldorf, Germany that's billed as the largest printing equipment exhibition in the world.

Atlantic's new offerings include the OMEGA 210 digital industrial inkjet printer, the FLEXOJET 600 modular system for UV printing solutions, and the BRAILLEJET digital printer for Braille printing.

In a major step toward bringing contactless payments via mobile phones to the Canadian market, MasterCard Canada will test NFC-enabled phones with MasterCard PayPass capability on Bell Mobility's wireless network. The four-month closed trial will test secure over-the-air (OTA) provisioning of payment card credentials and the security of transactions made using mobile phones.

During the trial, PayPass-enabled phones will be used to make purchases at any merchant location in Canada that accepts MasterCard PayPass, by tapping the phone against a point-of-sale payment terminal.

Gemalto has announced its selection by Italian telecom company Telecom Italia Mobile (TIM) to support the launch of a transportation-related NFC program in Trento. The program will enable TIM customers to use their mobile phones to access public transit.

TIM-issued phones will have SIM cards embedded with Gemalto applications, enabling the remote purchase of tickets at anytime. Travelers will also be able to validate their transport pass even when the battery of their mobile phone is off.

Working with several telecom operators, Gemalto has launched transit-related NFC programs in several locations throughout Europe, including the French cities of Grenoble, Rennes and Paris. The TIM system will be the first such NFC system in Italy.

Germany’s SCM Microsystems has entered into a Memorandum of Understanding with Sony Corporation to develop and supply FeliCa contactless card readers for international markets. The arrangement allows SCM to develop a line of FeliCa products targeting the enterprise, mobile and banking markets, beginning with FeliCa Physical Access Control Terminals (PACT).

FeliCa, created by Sony, is the standard for contactless payment in Japan. All SCM terminals and readers developed under the cooperation are anticipated to be ISO 14443 and FeliCa capable and fully support Near Field Communication functionality.

SCM expects to introduce the first readers in its FeliCa portfolio in the fourth quarter of 2008. Additional products to be added to the line are under discussion between the two companies.

VeriFone Holdings Inc. has announced that Canadian restaurant chain Tim Hortons, has extended its use of VeriFone payment solutions to countertop checkout stations and drive-thru lanes in their U.S. locations. Last year, Tim Hortons – Canada’s largest quick service restaurant chain – deployed 7,500 VeriFone Vx 570 systems with EMV-ready VeriFone SC 5000 PINpads throughout store locations in Canada.

The restaurant introduced the VeriFone technology to enable credit card and contactless payments and to convert from paper-based gift certificates to its prepaid QuickPay Tim Card. The U.S. rollout began in February, with approximately 1,000 Vx 570 systems installed at 375 stores to date; the Canadian deployment began last summer and has now extended to more than 2,100 stores.

McAfee security specialists say contactless payments technology pose a threat to consumers’ financial information, according to Reuters UK.

Mobile devices have little or not security, says Greg Day, an analyst at security specialist McAfee. At least 79% of consumers are using unprotected mobile phone handsets, while 15% are don’t know the security levels, according to a recent poll of 2,000 mobile users in the UK, U.S. and Japan.

"The mobile space is fraudsters' biggest opportunity for the future, largely because many people still see their phone as a communication device, rather than something that they have to keep secure," says Day.

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McDonald’s will introduce a downloadable coupon for Sony Felica-enabled phones in its Japanese restaurants. The new payment application, called the Kasazu coupon, is downloaded onto a consumer’s phone at the point-of-sale. The consumer then places their phone on a reader to make the payment or use the coupon.

McDonald’s will initially test the e-coupon in 175 stores, and then roll it out in all 3,800 outlets in Japan. Many Japanese mobile phones feature the Sony Felica technology, making Japan a good location to test the concept. McDonald’s has not announced specific plans to take the Kasazu coupon beyond Japan’s borders, but experts generally agree that international adoption of this type of transaction technology will happen soon.

The appeal of this type of technology for companies like McDonald’s stems not just from the convenience it offers its consumers, but also the targeted marketing opportunities that it presents.

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Gemalto announced that the European Commission has authorized the financial grant by the French government to the MaXSSIMM development program through OSEO. OSEO is a French public agency that supports innovation and development and will contribute a €35-million subsidy over 3 years. 


MaXSSIMM involves development of a next-generation SIM card. The program, carried out by a Gemalto-led consortium, is intended to ease and quicken the implementation of personal and secure Internet services for mobile devices. The new systems would enable new capabilities that allow application developers to rapidly roll out new mobile personal and multimedia services.

The U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs awarded a $6.1 million contract to Verizon Business for PIV cards that comply with HSPD-12. The contract includes a one-year term and two optional extensions.

The VA is expecting to issue about 500,000 cards. Verizon Business will host and manage the Veterans Affairs credential solutions in a secure Verizon Business data center that is supported 24 hours a day, seven days a week, with services backed up by redundant systems.

Advantidge, Inc., a supplier of card printers, systems and supplies, announced the availability of the Corn Card, a new eco-friendly card solution with ecological advantages over traditional petroleum-based Polyvinyl Chloride (PVC) cards.

Millions of PVC cards are used every day in a plethora of applications and industries – cutting across nearly every social and business sector imaginable. These include photo IDs for schools and companies, membership cards, hotel room key-cards and gift and loyalty cards. But since their production is dependent on oil, a non-renewable resource, PVC cards adversely affect the environment, both in their manufacture and eventual disposal.

In a move to meet the growing demand for smart cards in Canada, INSIDE Contactless has joined Advanced Card Technologies Canada. Having already delivered more than 5 million of its MicroPass contactless payment chips for MasterCard PayPass deployments in the past six months, INSIDE Contactless has established itself as a provider of contactless payment technology to the Canadian market, and is now poised to deliver technology to aid in the convergence with EMV and other non-contactless applications.

Salto Systems has introduced a new RFID-enabled lock cylinder which offers a security alternative in situations where conventional electronic locks are not practical.

The Salto device fits a range of doors, from modern tubular steel designs to antique doors where an electronic handset would be either aesthetically inappropriate or not allowed by historic preservation codes. The British Airports Authority has already installed it in 2000 doors at Heathrow airport.

The lock is available in versions compatible with a number of RFID formats, and all versions are compatible with other Salto security solutions. Among its safety features are a panic design that allows it to always be opened from the inside, and a Portable Programming Device which can always be used to open the lock in emergency situations.

At the joint Smart Card Alliance annual meeting and CTST conference last week, the Smart Card Alliance Latin America (SCALA) says rapidly rising fraud rates due to skimming of magnetic stripe credit cards and shifts in fraud liability are fueling the migration of Latin American banks to smart cards based on the EMV standard.

An important change in the Latin American market is the chip liability shift program that protects the party that has upgraded cards or terminals if fraud occurs, according Kim Hangoc, vice president de Gesto de Produtos do Centro de Excelncia for MasterCard Worldwide. The program is across all of Latin America and has to do with liability for fraudulent transactions based on skimmed and cloned magnetic stripe cards.

After January 2005, if a cloned magnetic stripe from a chip-enabled card is used on a non-chip enabled merchant payment terminal, the acquirer is liable for the loss. If a skimmed magnetic stripe card is used in a chip-equipped terminal, the issuer is liable for the loss. Additionally, a domestic liability shift recently went into place in Brazil in March 2008, and is planned for October 2008 in Mexico and July 2009 in Venezuela.

Atos Origin and Sagem, a unit of Safran, have reportedly won a contract worth around 80 million Euros to produce electronic passports for the French government, according to Le Journal du Dimanche. The first e-passports were due to be produced at the end of June. Also competing for the contract was Thales-Accenture, Capgemini-Sopra Group and Bull-Zeltes.

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At the opening of the "SID DisplayWeek 2008" in Los Angeles, Korean display manufacturer Samsung SDI and Germany's Bundesdruckerei GmbH will present for the first time ever a passport featuring slim and bendable AMOLED (Organic Light Emitting Diode) display.

Even with the integrated color display, the data page of this e-passport made of polycarbonate is still only 700µm thin. According to the suppliers, tomorrow's ID documents will work without contact and without internal batteries. The integration of a display makes electronic ID documents even more difficult to forge and opens up the way for new and different security applications.

India will start issuing electronic passports to its government diplomats and officials in June, according to NewKerala.com. The new travel documents will be introduced to citizens within the next 11 months. For now the e-passports will contain a digital photo, but the Indian government might add fingerprints at a later date.

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While more than 100 million electronic passports have been issued in the last two years, more than 50 countries are still working on deploying the new travel documents, says Barry Kefauver, principal at Fall Hill Associates. “The bottom line is the new generation of passport is the most secure travel document the world has seen,” Kefauver says.

But issues remain, including remedying issues with breeder docu