Smart card architecture for dynamic and secure authentication

Abstract

Since the advent of the transistor and the birth of computers, technology has developed at a remarkable rate. Technological development usually occurs with a specific goal in mind, although such technological development often occurs in isolation from where it is to be finally implemented. This sometimes results in certain inefficiencies in the implementation of such technology. However, worse is that sometimes a technological solution developed for a specific application environment is used to solve a problem in a completely different environment. This can result in significantly inefficient or completely ineffective implementation of the technology. A case in point to illustrate inefficient implementation of technology is the need to carry multiple bank cards, even though the functionality that these bank cards provide is the same. This situation is exacerbated by the fact that banks are replacing magnetic strip-based bank cards with chip-based bank cards (smart cards), and yet, the number of cards that a person requires has not changed. This dissertation focuses on developing an efficient architecture that, once implemented, allows a person to effectively require only a single smart card. However, for the architecture to be truly efficient, it should not be confined to the banking environment, but rather allow a person to access any service with a single smart card. Creating such an architecture posed several questions regarding technical implementation details, security requirements of the information required by such an architecture, as well as the privacy implications of using such an architecture. These questions, implications and requirements were investigated, and an architecture that allows a person to access multiple services with a single smart card was devised. In addition, a messaging protocol was formulated for the purposes of the architecture. A prototype was created to demonstrate that it is possible to implement the architecture. The prototype also showed how effective and efficient the architecture is in allowing a person to use a single smart card to access a variety of services. This dissertation contributes to showing the possibility of effective and efficient implementation of technology, specifically in the area of smart cards and access control. It also suggests future research projects to improve upon the communication process, the encryption method and the privacy aspect of the architecture.