`SMART CARDS' MAY CARRY RISK : SYSTEM COULD BE PREY FOR COUNTERFEITING.Byline: John Markoff
New York, Middle Atlantic state of the United States. It is bordered by Vermont, Massachusetts, Connecticut, and the Atlantic Ocean (E), New Jersey and Pennsylvania (S), Lakes Erie and Ontario and the Canadian province of Times A potential security flaw has been discovered that might make it possible to counterfeit many types of electronic cash ``smart cards Example of widely used contactless smart cards are Hong Kong's Octopus card, Paris' Calypso/Navigo card and Lisbon' LisboaViva card, which predate the ISO/IEC 14443 standard. The following tables list smart cards used for public transportation and other electronic purse applications. .'' Touted as the key to a cashless society, smart cards are credit card-size packets that contain a microprocessor chip and a small amount of computer memory for storing bits of electronic information that represent money. At businesses equipped with the computerized devices that accept smart-card payments, the cards are supposed to be as good as cash - and as vulnerable to theft or loss. The types of smart cards that are potentially at risk include the kinds already employed in the Mondex cash card system and others used by European consumers. A cash card from Visa was demonstrated in a highly publicized trial at the summer Olympic Games The Summer Olympic Games or the Games of the Olympiad are an international multi-sport event held every four years, organised by the International Olympic Committee. in Atlanta. Chase Manhattan Corp., Citibank, MasterCard and Visa plan a test this year with 50,000 customers in New York City New York City: see New York, city. New York City City (pop., 2000: 8,008,278), southeastern New York, at the mouth of the Hudson River. The largest city in the U.S. . Now, however, scientists at Bell Communications Research, are sounding an alarm, saying that a sophisticated criminal might be able to tweak a card chip to make a counterfeit copy of the monetary value. Richard Lipton, chief scientist at Bell Communications, has been quietly notifying the seven regional Bell telephone companies, some of who have been planning to market smart cards as a secure way to pay for long-distance calls. Researchers believe it is possible to short-circuit the data-scrambling software contained in many of the cards. The software is used to protect the card's secret code, which is designed to prevent counterfeiting. In theory, at least, the researchers said a smart card's security could be breached by forcing the microchip in the card to make a calculation error. This could be done through sophisticated means like bombarding Bombarding is the process of 'pumping' a Cold Cathode Lighting tube (otherwise called Neon Signs). Information A detailed process of bombarding can be found here, Bombarding. the card with radiation, or cruder methods like placing it in a microwave oven. Once the card can be forced to make even a small calculating error, the researchers said that a mathematical formula they derived could use this error to extrapolate extrapolate - extrapolation the secret data that authenticates the card when it is inserted in a merchant's card reader. Not everyone considers the theoretical threat a real danger. ``This is very speculative,'' said Chris Jarman, vice president of chip card technology at MasterCard. ``I have yet to see a smart-card scheme with a vulnerability.'' |
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