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Siemens develops multifaceted ID card

In an age of increased terrorist threats, illegal immigration and rising crime, increasing emphasis is being placed on the development of effective and secure citizen identification cards.

The Italian state printing authority has ordered an ID smartcard from Siemens that should make it easier for citizens to interact with public agencies, which according to the government in Rome, more than 50 million people are expected to use within the next five years.

Known as the Carta d'Identita Elettronica (CIE), this new ID card integrates several different functions previously contained on separate cards. For example, the CIE will not only serve as an official lD card, but also as a health insurance card and as a means for gaining access to public facilities. The CIE will also contain biometric data, such as the owner's fingerprints and information on facial features.

The new smartcard will also enable the public to handle administrative processes such as digitally filing tax returns from their home computers, so citizens will no longer have to spend time going to government agencies while civil servants will benefit from a reduced workload.

The range of applications can be expanded as needed. For example, the CIE, which will be delivered by Siemens Business Services, could be used as an electronic ballot card in elections. Security considerations play a major role in such applications, so the smartcard's operating system meets the highest standards in this category. In fact, Germany's Bundesamt für Sicherheit in der Informationstechnik (Federal Agency for Information Technology Security) has awarded the system the 'ITSEC E4 hoch' certificate, which means that it is resistant to all known types of hacker attacks. The CIE also owes its wide range of uses to this system, and thanks to its modular design, can be integrated into a wide variety of applications.

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