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May 2007 • Volume 12 Number 5 |
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Executive Director's Letter Dear members and friends of the Alliance, In case you haven’t noticed, the Smart Card Alliance has been making a lot of announcements and has been in the news a great deal in the last few weeks. Some of these have been positive, industry-driving announcements about the Alliance and the market advances that are happening; other news items have been more controversial, and even confrontational in nature, which is not something we enjoy dealing with. Let's look at some of the positive forward-thinking news first. The biggest news, I think, was the announcement we made jointly with SourceMedia, producer of the CardTech SecurTech Conference and Exhibition, about our partnering agreement for the 2008 CardTech SecurTech Conference in Orlando, FL. Beginning in 2008, the Smart Card Alliance Annual Conference normally held in October each year will move to May and will be co-located with the CTST Conference. The Alliance will assume full responsibility for the CTST conference programming and training agenda and support SourceMedia in developing an expanded and improved conference and exhibition event. A specially-arranged member appreciation breakfast briefing was held at last week's 2007 CTST event in San Francisco to discuss the new partnership. Our members there learned first-hand from SourceMedia CTST representatives how much value they see in this partnership and how they feel that the partnership is long overdue. My strong belief is that entering into this agreement puts the Smart Card Alliance and its members on a much larger stage to positively influence the adoption of advanced card technology across the wide spectrum of vertical market users that attend the industry's largest event in North America each year. Moving the Annual Conference to the spring will require us to adjust the schedule for our other conference but, as a result, there will be two great events in 2008 instead of three - which should be welcome news for the many industry people who are suffering from "conference fatigue" from participating in the large number of events that are currently held.
This month, Smart Card Talk spoke with Stephen Howard, VP, Business Development, Identity Management, for Thales e-Security, Inc. Mr. Howard has over 24 years of information technology experience and knowledge. Success in these areas was born on a wealth of technology experience from sixteen years in software, systems engineering and information security covering both commercial and government sectors. Mr. Howard has extensive experience in public key cryptographic solutions, biometric technology, smart card systems, and large scale IS/IT infrastructures. Mr. Howard led the technology tiger team that developed FIPS 201 recommendations to NIST on behalf of the GSC-IAB. He is experienced in systems and operations of smart cards technologies inclusive of silicon fabrication, manufacturing, cryptography, contactless, and biometric methods. Mr. Howard is vice chair of the Smart Card Alliance Identity Council and presents in Smart Card Alliance-sponsored tutorials for smart cards in IT solutions and Federated ID activities.
Using FIPS 201 PIV Cards with Physical Access Control Systems: Recommendations to Optimize Transaction Time and User Experience
Operational Differences Operational differences between the two technologies can impact the user experience. For example, the new PIV smart card is a departure from the low frequency proximity cards in use today. Agencies and installers must be aware of, and prepare for, operational differences between these technologies. Differences include:
Another difference is how the use of the card differs: individuals used to the “wave and go” nature of a proximity card will need to be trained to “touch and hold” the PIV card. All of these differences should be considered during installation and be a part of the end user training when implementing a PIV card-enabled PACS.
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FIPS 201-1 PIV II end-point smart cards provide enhanced interoperability and unify identity verification for use in both logical and physical access control. Users need to understand why there is a difference in the system behavior when using PIV smart card technology vs. the typical proximity cards and readers in wide use today in order to obtain the best possible user experience from the new PIV II card-enabled physical access control systems (PACS). 
Executive Director's Letter
