New ID standard is just the first of two-part plan

 

Connecting state and local government leaders

The debate over specifications for federal and contractor employee identification cards did not end with the Commerce Department's release of the Personal Identity Verification standard late last month. Locked in a small room somewhere are federal and industry experts discussing technical details for biometrics, card interfaces and encryption requirements.

The debate over specifications for federal and contractor employee identification cards did not end with the Commerce Department's release of the Personal Identity Verification standard late last month.Locked in a small room somewhere are federal and industry experts discussing technical details for biometrics, card interfaces and encryption requirements.And it is these details that agencies, manufacturers of cards and card readers, and systems integrators are fretting over.'The devil will be in the details, and there are a few different details that need to be clarified for what will work and what will not,' said Jeremy Grant, enterprise solutions vice president at Maximus Inc., a card manufacturer in Reston, Va. 'The proposed changes worried a lot of people because it would necessitate new cards and new certification processes.'Maximus is one of four contractors for the General Services Administration's Smart Access Common ID program. GSA awarded the smart-card pacts in 2000.President Bush issued Homeland Security Presidential Directive 12 Aug. 27, ordering the National Institute of Standards and Technology to produce within six months a federal standard for secure and reliable IDs for federal employees and contractors.NIST will issue separate publications for biometric, card encryption and card interface technical specifications. NIST considered including them in the Federal Information Processing Standard 201 but needed more time, said Ed Roback, chief of NIST's Computer Security Division.FIPS-201 spells out the common ID and security requirements for applications that will use the new cards. Agencies must implement it by Oct. 25.The second section of the standard discusses the technical specifications of the card and components required for interoperability across all agencies.The Office of Management and Budget has not set the deadline for implementing the second part of the document. Many industry experts said the administration likely will choose October of next year as the deadline.Agencies have until June 25 to submit a program to OMB for compliance with the standard. Within another four months, agencies must be in initial compliance.'We tried to make sure we came out with something that was a consistent whole,' Roback said. 'We were quite pleased we were able to get something out in the time the president required. There is a lot more work ahead for NIST, the agencies and industry.'And it is what NIST did not address that is causing the most concern among agencies and vendors. Although no federal smart-card officials would discuss their concerns publicly, most said they are withholding judgment until NIST completes the final card interface specifications.In a draft version of these specs, NIST recommended that agencies slowly migrate to the new federal ID cards. This would let agencies use the existing Government Smart Card Interoperability Standards, developed by NIST and the Government Interoperability Advisory Board, during the first phase of compliance with FIPS-201.'This approach is most favorable to those agencies who have currently implemented smart-card-based identity applications,' NIST said in the draft Special Publication 800-73. 'The near-term solution may also be acceptable to agencies who plan to adopt an existing solution. Agencies that currently do not implement smart-card solutions may elect to implement long-term solutions from the beginning and avoid the step of near-term solutions.'NIST officials had hoped to get both standards finished by March 1, but the controversy over the need for a migration strategy delayed the final release of SP 800-73.Another benefit of letting agencies migrate to the standard over a long period of time, Grant and others said, is that it would give vendors more time to develop products.Besides the lack of a plan for moving to the new standards, another issue that agencies and industry have is the format of the fingerprints for the cards. NIST's draft version called for a fingerprint image, which creates a larger file than the fingerprint template many experts believe is the easiest and best way to store the information.'If the cards hold 64K of information and you want to take up between 30K and 40K for just the fingerprints, that doesn't leave much room for other information,' Grant said. 'Templates take about 1K of space.'NIST's Roback said there have to be adjustments to GSCIS because the standard does not provide all the needed technology specifications for interoperability. 'A few functions are not addressed in the GSCIS, like key management,' he said.Jim Dray, leader of NIST's Government Smart-Card Program, said blending the new specifications with GSCIS has been the biggest challenge for NIST's team.'There isn't a lot of time to work out the security architecture of the chip and the biometric issues,' said Randy Vanderhoof, executive director of the Smart Card Alliance, an industry association in Princeton Junction, N.J. 'Developing specifications is hard because so many products and processes are already in place.'The new cards will be used both for physical and systems access, and NIST specifies a handful of technologies. Each card must have an embedded programmable chip, contact and contactless (wireless) interfaces, and support for four levels of security.It will use cryptographic tools for higher levels of security and will contain biometric data to verify identity.Because biometric standards now exist only for fingerprints, FIPS-201 calls for their use, although other forms of biometrics could be added later.Each card can also include a magnetic stripe and a bar code, too.NIST received comments from more than 90 agencies and private-sector organizations and finished FIPS-201 in six months. Computer security specialists at NIST said recently that preparing such a standard generally is a two-year process.Roback said NIST made a number of changes to the final document, including removing the requirement for a digital photo because it would take up too much space.Privacy and security also were major concerns, he said.'We are only requiring a minimum amount of information for wireless reading, and when the card is not in use, it should be stored in an electromagnetic holder to prevent inadvertent reading,' Roback said. 'We also added a section requiring agencies to hire a privacy official and conduct a privacy impact assessment.'OMB is developing an implementation guidance that will address privacy issues, Roback added.
New ID standard is just the first of two-part plan














More to come






































In the end







X
This website uses cookies to enhance user experience and to analyze performance and traffic on our website. We also share information about your use of our site with our social media, advertising and analytics partners. Learn More / Do Not Sell My Personal Information
Accept Cookies
X
Cookie Preferences Cookie List

Do Not Sell My Personal Information

When you visit our website, we store cookies on your browser to collect information. The information collected might relate to you, your preferences or your device, and is mostly used to make the site work as you expect it to and to provide a more personalized web experience. However, you can choose not to allow certain types of cookies, which may impact your experience of the site and the services we are able to offer. Click on the different category headings to find out more and change our default settings according to your preference. You cannot opt-out of our First Party Strictly Necessary Cookies as they are deployed in order to ensure the proper functioning of our website (such as prompting the cookie banner and remembering your settings, to log into your account, to redirect you when you log out, etc.). For more information about the First and Third Party Cookies used please follow this link.

Allow All Cookies

Manage Consent Preferences

Strictly Necessary Cookies - Always Active

We do not allow you to opt-out of our certain cookies, as they are necessary to ensure the proper functioning of our website (such as prompting our cookie banner and remembering your privacy choices) and/or to monitor site performance. These cookies are not used in a way that constitutes a “sale” of your data under the CCPA. You can set your browser to block or alert you about these cookies, but some parts of the site will not work as intended if you do so. You can usually find these settings in the Options or Preferences menu of your browser. Visit www.allaboutcookies.org to learn more.

Sale of Personal Data, Targeting & Social Media Cookies

Under the California Consumer Privacy Act, you have the right to opt-out of the sale of your personal information to third parties. These cookies collect information for analytics and to personalize your experience with targeted ads. You may exercise your right to opt out of the sale of personal information by using this toggle switch. If you opt out we will not be able to offer you personalised ads and will not hand over your personal information to any third parties. Additionally, you may contact our legal department for further clarification about your rights as a California consumer by using this Exercise My Rights link

If you have enabled privacy controls on your browser (such as a plugin), we have to take that as a valid request to opt-out. Therefore we would not be able to track your activity through the web. This may affect our ability to personalize ads according to your preferences.

Targeting cookies may be set through our site by our advertising partners. They may be used by those companies to build a profile of your interests and show you relevant adverts on other sites. They do not store directly personal information, but are based on uniquely identifying your browser and internet device. If you do not allow these cookies, you will experience less targeted advertising.

Social media cookies are set by a range of social media services that we have added to the site to enable you to share our content with your friends and networks. They are capable of tracking your browser across other sites and building up a profile of your interests. This may impact the content and messages you see on other websites you visit. If you do not allow these cookies you may not be able to use or see these sharing tools.

If you want to opt out of all of our lead reports and lists, please submit a privacy request at our Do Not Sell page.

Save Settings
Cookie Preferences Cookie List

Cookie List

A cookie is a small piece of data (text file) that a website – when visited by a user – asks your browser to store on your device in order to remember information about you, such as your language preference or login information. Those cookies are set by us and called first-party cookies. We also use third-party cookies – which are cookies from a domain different than the domain of the website you are visiting – for our advertising and marketing efforts. More specifically, we use cookies and other tracking technologies for the following purposes:

Strictly Necessary Cookies

We do not allow you to opt-out of our certain cookies, as they are necessary to ensure the proper functioning of our website (such as prompting our cookie banner and remembering your privacy choices) and/or to monitor site performance. These cookies are not used in a way that constitutes a “sale” of your data under the CCPA. You can set your browser to block or alert you about these cookies, but some parts of the site will not work as intended if you do so. You can usually find these settings in the Options or Preferences menu of your browser. Visit www.allaboutcookies.org to learn more.

Functional Cookies

We do not allow you to opt-out of our certain cookies, as they are necessary to ensure the proper functioning of our website (such as prompting our cookie banner and remembering your privacy choices) and/or to monitor site performance. These cookies are not used in a way that constitutes a “sale” of your data under the CCPA. You can set your browser to block or alert you about these cookies, but some parts of the site will not work as intended if you do so. You can usually find these settings in the Options or Preferences menu of your browser. Visit www.allaboutcookies.org to learn more.

Performance Cookies

We do not allow you to opt-out of our certain cookies, as they are necessary to ensure the proper functioning of our website (such as prompting our cookie banner and remembering your privacy choices) and/or to monitor site performance. These cookies are not used in a way that constitutes a “sale” of your data under the CCPA. You can set your browser to block or alert you about these cookies, but some parts of the site will not work as intended if you do so. You can usually find these settings in the Options or Preferences menu of your browser. Visit www.allaboutcookies.org to learn more.

Sale of Personal Data

We also use cookies to personalize your experience on our websites, including by determining the most relevant content and advertisements to show you, and to monitor site traffic and performance, so that we may improve our websites and your experience. You may opt out of our use of such cookies (and the associated “sale” of your Personal Information) by using this toggle switch. You will still see some advertising, regardless of your selection. Because we do not track you across different devices, browsers and GEMG properties, your selection will take effect only on this browser, this device and this website.

Social Media Cookies

We also use cookies to personalize your experience on our websites, including by determining the most relevant content and advertisements to show you, and to monitor site traffic and performance, so that we may improve our websites and your experience. You may opt out of our use of such cookies (and the associated “sale” of your Personal Information) by using this toggle switch. You will still see some advertising, regardless of your selection. Because we do not track you across different devices, browsers and GEMG properties, your selection will take effect only on this browser, this device and this website.

Targeting Cookies

We also use cookies to personalize your experience on our websites, including by determining the most relevant content and advertisements to show you, and to monitor site traffic and performance, so that we may improve our websites and your experience. You may opt out of our use of such cookies (and the associated “sale” of your Personal Information) by using this toggle switch. You will still see some advertising, regardless of your selection. Because we do not track you across different devices, browsers and GEMG properties, your selection will take effect only on this browser, this device and this website.