Gemalto wins Portuguese national ID contract
France-based companies dominance of the European identification market continues; new ID will include social security, taxpayer, and health care numbers; cardholders will use a PIN number to authenticate themselves; card can be used to sign government documents
France-based Gemalto’s efforts to dominate the international identification market continue apace, even as the company’s other units continue to struggle. (The company recently reported a a 19 percent increase in sales to €42 million, mainly as a result of its ePassport sales.) Gemalto announces recently that it has been selected by Portuguese authorities to develop that country’s national identification card. Known as the “citizen card,” the new ID will include a raft of critical information, including citizens’s taxpayer, social security, and health care identification numbers, and will also replace, in the future, the elector card. Citizens will use a secret PIN number to identify and authenticate themselves, and the card will also generate a legally-binding digital signature for secure declarations and administrative procedures. In addition, forensic and police authorities will have the ability to check a carrier’s identity against fingerprint data stored on the card.
-read more in this company news release
