Gemplus sells EMV cards to leading Chinese bank

Luxemburg-based Gemplus International, a provider of smart card solutions, has delivered EMV credit cards offering high security for transactions for the leading Chinese bank, Industrial and Commercial Bank of China (ICBC). The cards were manufactured locally by Gemplus’s joint venture with Goldpac Group in Zhuhai, which is already EMV-certified by MasterCard International, VISA, DINER, and China UnionPay. The cards are based on Gemplus’ GemXpresso Pro, and are compliant with the latest specifications from MasterCard, MCHIP/4.0. With Dynamic Data Authentication (DDA) on board, the cards provide the most advanced security available for securing payment transactions.

EMV stands for “Europay MasterCard VISA” (and, unofficially, for eyes, motor, and verbal, the three dimensions of the Glasgow Coma Score). IC card systems based on EMV are becoming more prevalent around the world, at times using names such as “IC Credit” and “Chip and PIN.” The EMV standard defines the interaction at the physical, electrical, data, and application levels between IC cards and IC card processing devices for financial transactions. Portions of the standard are based on the IC Chip card interface defined in ISO 7816. Why is it that we are not surprised to note that the system is not compatible with the earlier Carte Bleue smart cards, which have been deployed in France since 1992? Well, Carte Bleue is slowly also moving toward the EMV standard.