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July, 1997 |
  
Amex Unveils Pre-Paid Amex Card For UK/US Travelers |
From the SmartCard and Electronic Security front line....Amex Unveils Pre-Paid Amex Card For UK/US TravelersAmerican Express UK has started pilot tests on a prepaid "smart" Amex card that can be loaded with up to US$10,000-worth of cash, and spent at most Amex locations. Unlike conventional Amex charge and credit cards, the prepaid Amex cards are based on smart card technology, although they have a magnetic stripe for EFTPOS (electronic funds transfer at point of sales) terminals. The cards can also be used at Amex-compatible ATMs to draw cash, using the Express Cash system. Instead of the cash being debited from the cardholder’s bank account, however, the money is taken off the card account. A pilot test is scheduled for later this year, with the cards aimed at UK people wanting to travel to the US, where most Amex outlets are electronic. The cards will go on sale shortly through branches of the Britannia Building Society, The Royal Bank of Scotland, the Woolwich Bank and Lunn Poly, the travel agency, will be known as "TravelFunds" and bear the Amex logo. Plans call for the TravelFunds trial to be carried out until the end of the year. If they prove successful, cards may be more widely available. (Contact: American Express Press Office +44-171-834-5555) TopSchlumberger Announces New Phase Of Visa Cash TechnologySchlumberger has announced a new phase in the development of the Visa Cash smart card-based debit card system. The smart card/chip developer claims it has developed a new series of cards that will extend the card’s versatility with reloadable technology and the introduction of loyalty systems. According to company officials, following the successful launch last August of disposable Visa Cash cards in Hong Kong, new reloadable features are being made available for the first time at automated teller machine (ATM) cards. This new form of payment technology will, the company claims, allow consumers to choose to withdraw money in the form of cash, or as electronic units loaded into a dedicated area of the smart card’s memory. The operating system which Schlumberger developed for the smart card chip also provides the banks with a built-in option to run additional loyalty programs alongside Visa Cash. Once the banks decide to make this feature available, it will, it is claimed, provide retailers with a powerful tool for enhancing relationships with customers, allowing them to store points and tokens in an independent memory area which can only be accessed using special secret keys. The reloadable Visa Cash cards — which will be marketed as "Smart BOC Card" and "Smart Moneylink" — may be loaded with up to HK$3,000 and checked at designated ATM machines operated by the Bank of China Group and Standard Chartered Bank. Around 1,000 gas stations, fast food chains, department and convenience stores, supermarkets, and other service providers in Hong Kong already accept Visa Cash transactions, with many more being signed up following the introduction of this new phase of the project, the company claims. According to Visa, Hong Kong consumers have already made over half a million purchases using the disposable cards. The card issuer sees the new reloadable cards as the next important step towards using cards for small value transactions, and leading even further towards a combined "payment and relationship" card. Jack Liu, Schlumberger’s managing director for Asia, claims that smart cards are undoubtedly the catalyst "for fundamental change in the way that goods and services are sold, opening up major opportunities for new financial services." Schlumberger officials said that they expect many similar projects in Asia to follow this example, and have produced a full range of Visa cash-compatible cards with memory sizes from 5 to 8 kilobytes, to help banks and card operators bring applications to market rapidly. (Contact: Schlumberger Measurement & Systems Asia +65-746-6344; Fax:+65-742-6484; E-mail: schew@singapore.asia.slb.com) TopATMs That Recognize Your Eye’s Iris ComingIt will soon be possible for customers to identify themselves at automated teller machines (ATMs) with their iris rather than with a personal identification number (PIN). NCR Corporation has teamed up with Sensar Inc., to develop, distribute and supply Sensar’s IrisIdent identity verification system. NCR will distribute, supply and service the IrisIdent system on a non-exclusive basis to banks and other financial institutions in all parts of the world outside Japan. Iris identification is rapidly being accepted as the biometric standard of choice. Unlike other forms of biometric identification such as human feature recognition elements (i.e. a voice, face or hand) the iris does not change over time. As IrisIdent offers a level of security that greatly enhances the confidence of both banks and consumers to use ATMs for high-value transactions, PINs and passwords may soon become obsolete. "NCR’s personal range of ATMs allow banks to deliver valuable documents as diverse as airline tickets, insurance certificates and stocks and bonds. Until now, concerns over fraud have made banks reluctant to make full use of these capabilities. Now, IrisIdent will give banks the security they need to offer these valuable services to their customers," said Kicki Wallje-Lund, vice-president, business development and strategic marketing at NCR’s Financial Systems Group. Introduced in Hong Kong earlier this year, the NCR personaS — a new generation of advanced self-service ATMs — enable banks and other ATM owners to customize their self-service units. IrisIdent uses standard video cameras and highly specialized real-time image processing to obtain images of an iris at a distance of up to three feet. The image is then digitally encoded and kept on file, just as a PIN is today. When identity verification is required, a camera again acquires an image of the person’s iris and compares that biometric signature with the one on file — all in less than a few seconds. The IrisIdent product, based on a proprietary technology licensed from US-based IriScan, is expected to be launched as a commercial product in the fourth quarter of 1997.
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