Smart cards stalled

If you are waiting for the cashless society, don?t hold your breath, advises end user and vendor body, the Smart Card Forum, writes Jan Howells.

Companies say that they will not be interested in smart card technology until the technology?s cost falls further. Customers may also prove hard to please: each smart card has its own proprietary system, which means users will end up carrying a wallet full of cards.

The Smart Card Forum has released a study which shows that more than 65% of the people it surveyed want all their data on one or two cards at most. They also want the option to add applications to a card, such as a record of drug prescriptions.

Banks, however, are keen to establish their own intellectual property rights and brand recognition before a standard is set.

They also complain that standards bodies move so slowly that it would be easy for Microsoft to hop into the ring and set a de facto standard.

?Gates has the resources to distribute 200 million cards with every PC and create his own standard,? said Miguel Abranowicz, vice president at Citibank.

Europe and Asia are more active in smart card technology than the UK. Norway, for example, has issued its entire population with smart cards to carry medical records and identification. In the UK, a pilot trial of the Mondex smart card in Swindon is still being reviewed.

? Report by VNU Newswire.