Open Source and Smart Cards? 14
jortega asks: "I am looking into implementing a photo ID system using smart cards, preferably using open-source and cheap components. We currently have several systems for libraries, meal plans, identification using older ID cards, and more, yet none of these systems integrate with each other. I envision a system where a smart card can accommodate all these things in addition to things like print management, purchasing books at the bookstore, meal plans, and security. I have looked extensively on Google and other sites, and while I can find a lot on information on smart cards, I haven't been able to find much on a cheap open-source system that I can build on to accomplish this. Does the Slashdot community have any advice on what to do and where to go from here."
Someplace to Try (Score:5, Interesting)
They are mainly amained at logging at various points on a network but they provide programming APIs which could be of use to you or someone in your organization to work towards implementing a system.
This place [towitoko.com] has readers from what appear to be pretty good prices that support the opencard api. There are other readers at the first side and even a list of supported card formats at the opencard site.
Towitoko even has some POS type readers with keypads for PIN input w/ and w/o LCD displays.
I did a bit of research into the topic yesterday and those are the most promissing bits.
Hope it helps!
Re:Someplace to Try (Score:3, Informative)
You can find JPCSC and other open source smart card stuff at the MUSLCE project. [linuxnet.com]
Also, I happen to be on a team that has implemented a smart card based photo ID system. Contact me through the email on my webpage (linked to in the header of this post) if you have questions and I'll get back to you on my corporate acocunt.
Re:Someplace to Try (Score:2)
JVM (Score:2)
A few years ago Sun was touting various sizes of Java, including a JVM that could be run in something as small as a smartcard. I don't know what the prices of licensing a commercial JVM for your application, but it's possible that a free one might work if you you're willing to take some lumps in footprint, performance.
JavaCard and MUSCLE (Score:2, Informative)
A previous poster mentioned the MUSCLE [linuxnet.com] project. It provides lots of open-source software for talking to smartcards, primarily for cryptographic applications.
MUSCLE works with JavaCards [sun.com] . With these it is relateively easy to write your own applets that run on the card and do whatever you want.
Lots of vendors supply JavaCard-compliant cards. For example, SchlumbergerSema [smartcards.net], iButton [ibutton.com], and Gemplus [gemplus.com].
Linux and Smartcards (Score:4, Informative)
The link to www.towitoko.de is one you could look at. They have a Linux devleopers pack which has a reader and couple of smartcards (memory cards, not processor cards, though) as well as a CDRom with Linux drivers. This things works well. I have this past weekend hacked apart their test program to write some utlilities which I can happily send you.
I have a writecard, readcard and hashcard util which writes stdin to a card, reads it or computes a hash of a card.
I use this to store a key with which (in conjunction with a password) I encrypt a filesystem. You need to stick the card in to mount the filesystem.
The site also has a link to a Linux-compatible port to PC/SC. I also think that Javacard works on Linux.
You could also look at ibutton.com They dfo smartcard stuff (very cool) but with a button form factor. Their development thingies also run on Linux AFAIK. In fact, there is a patch somewhere for GnuPG that allows you to have your private keys as well as the actual decryption routine, so the key never leaves the device, for a Java iButton somewhere. That runs on Linux.
If you need to know anything, mail me at yahoo.de AT netgrok (switch the name and domain). when I am finished I will post my stuff to freshmeat, but it is very rudimentary at the moment.
have you thought about this? (Score:2, Insightful)
Cheap smartcards have low amounts memory. but storing the photo + data itself might prove to be usefull as the display terminal won't need a direct connection to the central photo database. What will you do about lost,
You could use those silver cards (Score:1)
You could use those pic+eeprom silver cards which contain about 8kbyte of memory on the card and a powerfull pic processor...
I use them in a gpg-certificate handling system
Existing Photo ID Smartcard with Biometric System (Score:1)
This is a photo ID smartcard that allows me to pass through Singapore immigration (both ways) without having to take out my passport and having to deal with immigration officers. My identity is verified by a thumbprint scanner.
Read the following for more details:
http://app.ica.gov.sg/serv_citizen/othe