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August 2007 • Volume 12 Number 8 |
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Executive Director's Letter Dear members and friends of the Alliance, This month’s news coming out of Washington really has me asking myself: “Is anyone really paying attention to what is happening?” As many of you know, we have consistently taken a very firm stance when it comes to discussing our Federal government’s role in defining new recommendations and security solutions to protect our borders and prevent the proliferation of weak identification documents and poorly designed identity systems from jeopardizing security and threatening citizen privacy. What was made public this month in two reports issued by the Government Accountability Office (GAO) makes our concerns about the risks associated with the ID itself seem insignificant. A much bigger cause for concern may be the administration of the credentials or the personal information databases they link to. For those unfamiliar with this government agency, the GAO is the investigative arm of the U.S. Congress and serves as a watchdog to report to Congress and the public on what federal agencies say they will do, and what they actually do. The Smart Card Alliance position on identity credentials, which can be found in many different documents publicly accessible from the Alliance web site, applies to multiple DHS-led identity programs. These include the proposed REAL ID-compliant driver’s license, the PASS card to be used by citizens without passports who re-enter the U.S. at land and sea borders from Canada, Mexico, and the Caribbean, and, the latest incarnation from DHS, the enhanced driver’s license that combines REAL ID and PASS card border crossing features into a state-issued driver’s license for border states (currently proposed in Washington, Vermont and Arizona). So as not to belabor the point raised countless times before, the preference publicly expressed in DHS documents currently defines long-range RFID technology as the machine readable technology (MRT) for PASS cards and enhanced driver’s licenses used as border crossing credentials (BCC) and 2D barcode as the common MRT for REAL ID compliant driver’s licenses. Both MRT technologies are bad for security and bad for citizen privacy. (If you don’t understand why they are bad, you should read the Alliance’s Government position papers.). The Alliance has taken issue not only with the credentials themselves, but with the complete ecosystem that is yet to be defined, but that will one day support these inherently weak credentials. Member Profile
Troy began working in identity solutions in 1995 and was responsible for leading the teams that developed and implemented a number of innovative automated inspections systems for the U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS), including the INS Passenger Accelerated Service System (INSPASS), Secure Electronic Network for Travelers Rapid Inspection/Dedicated Commuter Lane (SENTRI/DCL) and NEXUS. He was also instrumental in the successful implementations of the Ben Gurion Airport Express Entrysm System and the Basel Border Crossing Project, both in Israel. Over the past two years, Troy has applied his expertise and the expertise of his team to develop the EDS Assured Identity™ Solution, which was designed and developed to help agencies meet the Homeland Security Presidential Directive 12 mandate as well as provide an integrated, end-to-end identity management solution.
One of the country's oldest and largest voluntary teaching hospitals, New York’s Mount Sinai Hospital is a 1,171-bed tertiary-care teaching hospital, with a medical staff of nearly 1,800, treating patients in Manhattan's Upper East Side and Harlem. It is internationally acclaimed for excellence in clinical care, education and scientific research in nearly every aspect of medicine. Officials at Mount Sinai, recognizing the need for more effective ways to verify patient identity and facilitate clinical data exchange, partnered with Siemens, a leading healthcare technology vendor, to create the Personal Health Card (PHC) initiative. Recognizing that a truly effective solution to the problems of identity verification and information exchange had to work across multiple organizations, Mount Sinai partnered with nine other participating institutions in the greater New York City area to create a regional HealthSmart Network. Mount Sinai began issuing patient photo identification smart cards with embedded microprocessor chips that can store patient information and can be routinely updated by health care professionals throughout the network. Healthcare providers in the network are Mount Sinai Hospital of Queens, Cabrini Medical Center, Elmhurst Hospital, Atlantic Health, North General Hospital, Queens Hospital, St. John’s Riverside Hospital, Jersey City Medical Center and Settlement Health, a clinic in the East Harlem/El Barrio area. The cards can store vital patient information such as demographics, allergies, current medications and laboratory results, and uses a patient photograph to aid in the verification process. On the administrative side, the PHC provides a singular, snapshot view of the patient’s medical and personal information, which can be shared across the network among physicians and admission staff. The PHC cards can be read and updated at any institution in the network.
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This month, Smart Card Talk spoke with David Troy, Director of Identity Management Solutions for EDS' U.S. Public Sector. He has over 20 years of IT industry experience, including 11 years designing, delivering and supporting biometric identity solutions, an array of credentialing technologies and a variety of access control technologies.
Mount Sinai Medical Center Personal Health Card
Executive Director's Letter
