SCA criticises passport card plans

The Smart Card Alliance (SCA), a group that promotes the adoption of smart card technology is urging the federal government to reconsider the use of RFID chips for passport cards.

The US Department of State has proposed using cards containing RFID chips for people travelling in and out of areas, such as Mexico, Canada and the Caribbean, where passports have not previously been required.

The SCA, whose members provide ISO/IEC 14443-based contactless smart card and RFID products, said its members believe the vicinity read RFID (or ISO/IEC 18000-6 Type C) technology proposed by the government "is the wrong technology to implement a secure identification to implement in a secure identification card".

Sony has created a contactless IC card made from vegetable-based plastic. The new FeliCa contactless IC smart card is more than 51% composed of vegetable-based materials and offers numerous advantages such as reduced consumption of exhaustible resources, fewer greenhouse gas emissions and a more stable chemical composition.

The plastics used in the Sony FeliCa contactless IC smart card are derived from biomass. Sony developed the new environmental technology through the selection of polylactic acid as the main ingredient for the vegetable-based plastic and the careful choice of subsidiary ingredients.

Sony ensured that the communications, reliability and robust attributes of its FeliCa contactless IC cards were maintained in the new environmentally friendly cards.

Intercede's MyID system managed the identities of 8 000 diplomats, conference delegation members, Latvian and Nato supporting units, security personnel and volunteers at the Nato Summit in Riga.

This solution was primed by Oberthur Card Systems and delivered to the Ministry of Defence of Latvia in partnership with Intercede and Fargo. Intercede provided a complete system to personalise, issue and verify Oberthur smart card-based identity cards at this major international event.

Each Oberthur smart card was colour-coded according to role and security clearance, printed with a photograph of the card holder, secured with holograms and other security printing features to prevent forgery, and the electronic chip was personalized to enable secure cardholder verification.