Banka Koper of Slovenia Issues World's First Visa on MULTOS Card.

A major breakthrough for Financial Institutions worldwide, enabling issuers of Visa and MasterCard the choice of a single MULTOS platform to support both payment schemes, simplifying their card issuance and management processes.

SLOVENIA -- Banka Koper, one of the leading financial institutions in Slovenia, today became the world's first Visa issuer to deploy Visa Smart Credit and Debit on a MULTOS multi-application platform, marking the culmination of intensive effort for Banka Koper, and the MULTOS consortium members including Keycorp Ltd, Thales eSecurity and StepNexus. In addition to its recent relaunch of its MasterCard portfolio using M/Chip 4 on Keycorp MULTOS, Banka Koper is now rolling out its Visa chip card program, deploying multi-application MULTOS cards which support both VSDC and the Visa Dynamic Passcode Authentication application to support remote cardholder authentication.

Until today, MULTOS had not yet been certified as a platform for Visa International's chip applications and so Banka Koper had been unable to realise the full benefits of deploying a consistent open standard platform for all its smart card issuance needs. The certification of MULTOS and MULTOS step/one with Visa allows dual issuers the choice of a single MULTOS platform to support the chip applications of both payment schemes.

"Banka Koper is a firm believer in MULTOS technology." said Gojmir Nabergoj, senior consultant at Banka Koper. "Having finally managed to complete our deployment of chip cards across both payment brands without needing to support two different hardware platforms and associated personalisation systems, the Visa MULTOS card now contains both VSDC and the Visa Dynamic Passcode Authentication. The new Visa Electron Prepaid card now also contains our own PKI application, allowing users to load and benefit from the use of their digital certificates in e-related services."

Additional details of the project and the consortium members involved include:

Keycorp Limited (ASX:KYC), a global supplier of secure electronic transactions, recently gained full Type Approval from Visa Approval Services for its implementation of the Visa Smart Debit and Credit (VSDC) application on the Keycorp MULTOS I4E platform. This marks the third VSDC implementation by Keycorp to be approved by Visa recently and follows on from the successful certification of the Keycorp Infineon I4D MULTOS and the ID1 step/one platforms. This VSDC implementation is based on the latest VSDC 1.4.0 specifications from Visa International and has been approved on the Infineon SLE66CX162PE microslim security controller, running Keycorp's MULTOS 4.2 operating system.

Richard Cusson, GM of Smartcard Technologies at Keycorp added: "With this recent certification of Banka Koper, Keycorp and its partners strengthens the ability to offer a one-stop solution for dual issuers who previously may have relied on multiple platforms or alternative technologies. This is a major step forward for Financial Institutions worldwide wanting to unleash the full potential of their EMV card issuance using MULTOS"

StepNexus supported Banka Koper by providing VSDC scripting professional services and can provide a hosted VSDC for MULTOS data preparation service to further assist personalisation service bureaux who wish to offer a MULTOS solution to their customers.

John Wood, CEO of StepNexus and Chairman of the MULTOS consortium said: "With StepNexus now the owner of the original intellectual property behind MULTOS, and provider of MULTOS Key Management Services, and our ongoing collaboration with Global Platform leading to accommodation of MULTOS as a recognised technology within the GP standard, Visa members can fully embrace MULTOS and the advantages of consistency, openness and flexibility at its core."

About Banka Koper

Headquartered in the South West of Slovenia, Banka Koper has been operating for 50 years and is the owner country's first and biggest domestic payment card system, known as Activa, for which seven other Slovenian banks now hold sub-licenses. It is also the holder of a full license for card-related products within the MasterCard and Visa systems.

Located at the gateway to Central and Eastern Europe, a region with diverse cultures and rapidly-growing economies, it has been critical that Banka Koper adopts an innovative and proactive approach in order to capitalise upon its business development opportunities. Banka Koper is now a member of a new Intesa-San Paolo group.

For further information see: http://www.banka-koper.si or http://www.activa.si.

About MULTOS[TM]:

MULTOS is the world's leading open standard multi-application Operating System for smart cards, whose development is overseen and provided by a consortium of 16 smartcard and silicon manufacturers, payment schemes, card management system providers, and integrators. A range of applications including payment, authentication, digital identity, biometrics, loyalty, and contactless ticketing may securely co-reside on a MULTOS powered chip.

MULTOS cards utilize the STEP[TM] ("Secure Trusted Environment Provisioning") standard for secure device issuance, in-field update, and third-party privacy assurance More than 65 million MULTOS smart cards that have been issued in over 30 countries in projects providing banking, national identity, ePassport, campus security, secure ID and transit.

For further information, visit www.multos.com

About Keycorp

Keycorp Limited (ASX: KYC) is a global provider of secure electronic transactions with solutions from smartcards and point-of-service transaction systems to payment engines

and managed services.

Keycorp's electronic payment terminals include smartcard-capable online and offline terminals capable of processing credit, charge, debit and stored value transactions.

The terminals are designed for use at a retail point of sale, over the phone, in mobile environments or via the Internet, and can communicate with host systems via fixed or mobile communications.

Keycorp is a founding member of the MULTOS consortium, which has responsibility for developing the MULTOS multi-application smartcard operating system. Keycorp develops and distributes smartcard operating systems such as MULTOS, as well as smartcard applications.

For further information see: www.keycorp.net.

About StepNexus:

StepNexus enables a new era of secure services by providing pioneering technology solutions for securing devices and distributing protected content. StepNexus governs the STEP[TM] (Secure Trusted Environment Provisioning) standard methods for secure device issuance and control, secure package content loading and distribution, and application privacy management. StepNexus offers services and products associated with STEP and STEP-enabled platforms, and ensures that devices meet specific security and interoperability requirements necessary to receive STEP security validations.

StepNexus has more than 100 issuance partners and has enabled more than 70 million STEP-secured devices among governments, financial institutions, mobile carriers, and enterprise IT organizations, including the Hong Kong National ID, Major Middle Eastern Country's Residential ID, Turkish Military ID, and Kaohsiung City Government Transit Project.

StepNexus works with partners that implement device operating systems and applications meeting STEP specifications, including Nectar.NET implementers, the industry-backed MULTOS Consortium, and other STEP-enabled solution providers.

For more information visit www.stepnexus.com or http://services.stepnexus.com