Smart cards
A smart card is similar to a magnetic stripe card but contains a microprocessor chip. The first smart cards were prepaid telephone cards, which operated on stored prepaid values. They have moved on from this to be used for things such as library cards, credit cards, student cards, and electronic purses.

Today, there are three smart card types with different access methodologies.
Contact cards
With a contact smart card, the user inserts it into a reader in order to access the information on it. The data is then transferred once physical contact is made. The reader supplies power to the chip in the card through the contacts. These cards are used in financial applications such as store-value, debit, and credit cards because of their reliability and the high power available to the microchip processor. Contact cards are slower and require more servicing than contactless cards.
Contactless cards
Contactless cards communicate with the card reader using radio frequency technology. They are implanted with a radio antenna. No physical contact is required with the reader. Contactless smart cards are suitable for application in fast paced transactions. Proximity, close-coupled, and vicinity cards are sub-types of contactless cards. Vicinity cards are used in industrial tagging, car-park access, and library book tagging. Contactless cards cannot support encryption techniques and are expensive to manufacture. (more…)












































My name is Calvyn, from PENANG, an IT Engineer, Malaysia LIFE tech blogger. I am an IT Engineer who blog about my LIFE working Experience, such as Technology, Computing, Networking and also my hobbies, Photography.