Smart Cards

A smart card can store up to 100 times more information than a normal card. A smart card can contain private user information like financial facts, private encryption keys, account information, credit card numbers, health insurance information and so on. So the use of smart card is not limi ted to financial. transactions but a myriad of other convenience services. Smart cards are naturally better protected against misuse than conventional cards, because the smart card information is encrypted. Like the. conventional credit card which clearly shows your credit card number on the face of the card. So all a thief needs is that card number along with your forged signature to use your card. On the other hand, theft in a smart card is virtually impossible because a key to unlock the information is required, and there is no external clue that a thief can use. In addition, smart card provides a whole lot of convenience and portability, as it can help you get rid of 10 cards and keep one.

In practice there is a whole range of smart cards available. The differences come in the performance of the processor, the amounts of ROM or RAM, the speed of the interface, availability of specialized components for cryptography, and whether or not they can be programmed for different applications. If take a closer look, we will observe that smart cards can vary on almost anything and everything they can store. This gives an idea about the versatility provided by a smart card.

Smart, cards require some sort of reader to be functional and this where their growth has seen, a setback. The readers also differ on the technology used 'in the card. The most common among there are cards where the chips have an exposed contact that matches up with that in the reader when inserted in a slot. This technology is primarily used in point of sale terminals. Then there are other contact less cards that use infrared communication to exchange data with the user. It would be quite obvious to the reader that this technology is expensive: expensive enough to remain unpopular. Even if the technology becomes cheaper, another bottleneck would still remain. The use of smart cards for commerce over the net would still remain difficult, as it would require every PC to be equipped with the reader. With international trade in vision, it practically would be impossible to provide same technology to every PC in the world that would be interested in trading over. the net. So there is a long way to go before swiping at almost every technological interface becomes a reality.

The various advantages provided by a smart card can. be summed up as:

Portable Storage: When you talk about portability, it does not necessarily mean only in physical terms. Imagine the amount of information that becomes portable with the card. This would also mean that the owner will not have to stick to a single location in order to use his digital tokes, or electronic cash.

Secure Storage: As discussed earlier, because the information is always stored in an encrypted form, private and confidential information will remain absolutely secure in the card. Imagine storing money in your pocket, which even if anyone steals cannot use.

Trusted Execution Environment: Smart cards naturally will not be vulnerable to viruses or other intrusion risks that the PC's suffer. Because the applications run in protected environments, they can be given a greater degree of trust.

Multi usabihty: Since the smart cards would have the capability to store versatile data, the applications would also cover a wide range.

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