Infineon Technologies, the world’s leading supplier of integrated circuits for chip cards, announced that its secure microcontroller chips are used in the one million smart cards issued to date in the U.S. Department of Defense (DoD) Common Access Card program. The Infineon chip acts as the central processor, or computer brain, of the plastic smart cards that DoD began rolling out in October 2001 to provide approximately four million civilian and military employees and certain contractors with a single standard means of physical identification, building access and computer network access.
During the initial phase of the multi-year CAC program rollout, smart cards using the Infineon chip were the first available products to meet the security and performance requirements of the program. SchlumbergerSema uses the security microcontrollers to produce the smart cards provided to the DoD by Electronic Data Systems Corporation (EDS) under a contract awarded as part of the Defense Manpower Data Center s Common Access Card (CAC) program.
In smart cards like those used in the CAC program, the secure microcontroller works like the processor of a personal computer to run the operating system and application software. The chip has advanced security capabilities built-in, such as support for Public Key Infrastructure (PKI). These features work with other elements on the smart card to protect stored data and to ensure that only the individual owner of a card is able to use its features. In addition to the security microcontroller, the card contains a photograph, magnetic stripe, linear bar code, 2D bar code and several other anti-counterfeit security features.
Infineon is proud to be a part of the contract team helping to bring both advanced security and smart card capabilities to the U.S. DoD, said Joerg Borchert, vice president for Security & Chip Card ICs at Infineon Technologies North America Corp. We gained a worldwide market leadership position in chip card technology by partnering with card manufacturers and solution providers to consistently meet or exceed customer requirements, and we look forward to continuing to play a key role in this program.
The CAC program specifies smart card technology that is based on the open-Java platform and meets the stringent requirements of Federal Information Processing Standards (FIPS) 140-1/140-2 Level 2 certification. This provides both high-level security capability and the flexibility for the DoD to add additional application programs to the smart card in the future.
About Infineon
Infineon Technologies AG, Munich, Germany, offers semiconductor and system solutions for applications in the wired and wireless communications markets, for security systems and smart cards, for the automotive and industrial sectors, as well as memory products. With a global presence, Infineon operates in the US from San Jose, CA, in the Asia-Pacific region from Singapore and in Japan from Tokyo. In the fiscal year 2001 (ending September), the company achieved sales of Euro 5.67 billion with about 33,800 employees worldwide. Infineon is listed on the DAX index of the Frankfurt Stock Exchange and on the New York Stock Exchange (ticker symbol: IFX). Further information is available at [www.infineon.com][1].
[1]: http://www.infineon.com/
