Alasdair Darroch, director for biometrics developer Biostore, spoke at the Biometrics 2009 Conference in London revealing that the education sector may be leading the charge on utilization of biometrics with approximately 10% of schools utilizing the technology in some way, according to an Info Security article.

Among the areas in schools where biometrics are being utilized most commonly are libraries as a means of checkout, cafeterias for school lunch payment programs, access control and printer or copier access. Darroch adds that despite the widespread adoption of biometrics, no standards for use in schools have been set by authorities meaning it is still the responsibility of the vendors and developers to create secure solutions that do not leave students open to theft or misuse of their personal data.

When looking at acceptance rates, Darroch asserts that between 98% and 99% of students and their parents are happy with the use of biometrics in schools, but also maintains that parental consultation and providing of alternatives is crucial. When given the choice, Darroch points towards the popularity of social networking sites among students when he acknowledges that many are willing to give out some personal data for a reward in turn.

Read the full story here.

The CBORD Group has formed Integrated Security Solutions Group designed to focus on the company’s growing security business. The new sector is expected to support the deployment of CBORD’s growing catalog of security hardware and software. Mathew Birnbaum, Integrated Security Solutions Group manager, will lead the new business unit.

Integrated Security is intended to be a resource, including system consulting, design, and implementation, strategic partner selection and management, product strategy and management and marketing.

CBORD’s partner program, known as the CBORD Data Xchange Program, includes a variety of security providers such as Ingersoll Rand, HID, NICE Systems, Pelco and Cisco Systems.

The security group’s aim is to extend the reach of security systems to provide more complete control of campus security operations, including one-card transactions, access control, video surveillance, alarm management and emergency notification.

“In the ever-changing field of security technology, a fully integrated system and service mentality is key,” said Tim Tighe, CBORD’s president and CEO.

Every year half of all organizations suffer a security breach, said Michael Peele, associate engineer for facility and security systems at Georgetown University in Washington D.C. “Of those, 99% had both firewalls and anti-virus protection in place,” he adds. “There has been a shift from glory motivated vandals to those seeking financial gain,” he told attendees at a National association of Campus Card Users sponsored webinar on campus security trends.

One of the goals in implementing a security system is to reduce your vulnerabilities. “Threats are everywhere. You should remove data from where it doesn’t need to be.” The simple cure, he adds, is to physically secure, encrypt and firewall everything and use a separate network for security related data, such as CCTV, VoIP and access control files.

Still, having the best computer security means nothing if campuses don’t have physical security protecting facilities. “Which is why you need card readers on your doors,” says Peele.

Still, no matter how sophisticated or state-of-the-art your campus security system is, if your staff hasn’t been properly vetted, the money spent on security could be wasted. He suggests background checks on everyone who might be able to access your computer servers. “Your staff is your number one weak point. Perform background checks on all security staff, executives, management, auditors.”

No security system should be installed without a plan. “You should plan any security system in excruciating detail,” said Peele. “Start out by creating a model security facility without regard to budget or technology. Look at the existing structure and your model and prioritize with an eye towards closing the gap.”

Features of an integrated security management system include alarm management, access control and video surveillance. Integration and convergence of all these pieces includes monitoring, alarm management, computer aided dispatch and emergency response.

While video surveillance on campus has become increasingly popular, it’s most often used as a forensic tool after the fact, said Peele. Even if someone is watching, a guard can only monitor about eight screens at a time. After just 12 minutes of monitoring, he will miss 45% of activity. “After only 22 minutes the operator will miss 95%. Don’t assume someone is watching the screen,” he adds.

He suggests employing a video analytics system which analyzes activity and notifies security if there is something out of the ordinary. “You tell it what to look for, for example someone hopping a fence or someone going in a certain direction,” said Peele. “When the event the software is monitoring occurs, an alarm will sound.”

The analytics software could work for pedestrian safety, jaywalkers, running red lights, long lines in the cafeteria or bookstores, even students sneaking into the cafeteria, he added. Video analytics can be used with what he calls “dark screen monitoring. All the screens can be dark until you have actionable intelligence.” When the event occurs, the screen comes to life, showing the video of that event, said Peele.

He also suggested colleges be aware of Homeland Security Presidential Directive 12 and Federal Information Processing Standard 201. Both involve identification credentials being issued to federal employees and many of the new products in the market reference these initiatives.

“(FIPS 201) is an excellent resource for best practices,” said Peele. “These standards cover everything, including how to do background checks, the format of your ID card, whether bar code, mag strip, or contactless, the placement of the chip, etc.”

For the fourth straight year, U.S. Bank has ranked first in a privacy study conducted by the Ponemon Institute, a Traverse City, Mich.-based information management research firm. In addition, the institute’s Privacy Trust Study for Retail Banking has ranked the Minneapolis-based bank in the top five since it began the study six years ago.

The Ponemon Institute study measures consumer perceptions of trustworthiness for retail banking and identifies the issues that influence consumer opinion. This year, Ponemon found that while the global financial crisis has had a negative impact on banks’ scores overall, five of the top six banks saw an increase in their scores, including U.S. Bank.

Financial stability, customer service, clear privacy and security practice disclosures, online banking identity and authentication processes and a commitment to stand behind the customer in cases of a breach or identity theft were cited as positive factors impacting consumer trust in banks. Factors such as data breaches, rumors related to poor security practice and aggressive use of data coupled with offshore data management were found to have a detrimental effect on perception.

The 2009 Privacy Trust Study for Retail Banking was derived from a final sample of 6,950 surveys returned from adult consumers residing in all geographic regions of the United States.

Phishers are now after campus card information. At least one California institution, Fresno State, has reported that some student email accounts have come under attack, according to the school’s newspaper, The Collegian.

The fake email, purporting to be from the university, seeks a student’s Fresno State user ID and password. The university says it will never ask for personal identifying information via email and suggests any such scams be deleted.  

Two universities and a hospital are the recipients of CBORD’s Excellence Awards, presented recently at the campus card provider’s 30th annual User Group Conference in Baltimore. This year’s winners were recognized for innovative uses of CBORD solutions to drive revenue, reduce costs and improve safety and security.

The Visionary Award went to Ohio State University in recognition of its solutions to improve service and reduce costs in campus dining. The university uses CBORD’s Foodservice Suite to cut costs through forecasting and central ordering for its many units, as well as online solutions such as Webfood, NetNutrition, and NetCatering.

The Above and Beyond Award went to Jason Rossi, director of One Card and Campus Security Systems at the University of San Francisco, for his service to both his own university and the CBORD user community. Rossi’s expertise in campus card and access control management, including implementation of wired, wireless, and offline readers, has been shared with other CBORD users through customer listservs, user group conference presentations, and one-on-one consultations with other universities.

The One CBORD Award went to Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital in Dallas. for its integration of CBORD solutions for food service, nutrition service and cashless purchasing. Texas Health uses the Odyssey PCS cashless system along with Foodservice Suite and Nutrition Service Suite to handle accounting, ordering and inventory management that has resulted im improvements in productivity, lower expenses, increased revenue, and improved employee and patient safety.

CPI Card Group has released Card Designer 2.5. This latest version of the online software includes new and updated features.

Card Designer now has an updated online tool, enabling customers to get their cards to market faster. These upgraded features include a design checklist, pre-set templates and the ability to design not only the front but also the back of a card. Selecting a card background, placing graphical logos, text and network bugs will complete the design and make an image that is truly worth a thousand words.

The newest version of Card Designer also features the ability to upload high resolution artwork for card production. Requesting an order or pricing is a easy with updated forms that are more comprehensive, saving time as the customer places requests.

CPI Card Group’s Card Designer can be found here.

By Andy Williams, Associate Editor, Avisian Publications

If you want to know just how important your campus card system is to your university, shut it down for one day. After you’ve quelled the riots and handled the nasty phone calls from students, faculty and staff, who want to know why they can’t access their building, eat in the cafeteria, or make copies or check out library books, or do any one of a myriad of other things that campus cards allow, you’ll have your answer.

That, in essence, is the mantra of campus card guru Tom Bell, vice president of strategic consulting for Blackboard’s Transact system. He spoke to CR80News recently on positioning a campus card program.

“What you’ve got is an enterprise system, highly functional, that’s more important than the student information system,” says Bell. “If the student information system went down for a day, that would be okay. But if you took your campus transaction system down, then you’d have to figure out different ways to eat, to get into buildings…Imagine the attention you’d get if you turned your system off and went on vacation.”

This is what happened at Tulane University in Louisiana, but it wasn’t a vacation rather the rampages of Hurricane Katrina that caused the shutdown. “They couldn’t open up their college until they had the campus card system up and running,” says Bell.

Many administrators don’t realize that the school’s transaction system is running 24/7 and is critical to a college. “When campus senior managers understand that, they begin to understand the importance of it,” adds Bell.

Bell, one of the founders of NACCU, has been in the campus card business a long time. While he’s a Blackboard employee, he says he also considers himself an industry consultant and he travels extensively, lending his expertise to colleges who request it. “When I came to Blackboard, they told me they needed a campus card evangelist,” he says.

Bell thinks campus card offices aren’t doing a good enough selling job. One of his goals when visiting campuses is to help them be a little more politically savvy. “Tell people what you’re doing, create an annual report that describes what’s happening in this card office, the amount of money flowing through the office and the ubiquity of those readers,” he says. “You have to be thinking about how to present this card to your university. The campus card system is so important that everyone needs to understand what’s behind it. Right now, they take the card for granted. Yet, if the card doesn’t work, you have a wallet without money.”

Bell recommends that a college establish a campus card task force that meets once a semester to talk about where the campus card is going and then produce a report that goes to senior officials.

“We’ve done a good job at creating a system that works behind the scenes, but you need to get other people involved,” says Bell. “The campus card system has been supporting the mission of the university and no one talks about that.”

He says the question many people ask him has to do with maximizing revenue. “This gives me the opportunity to do a deep dive on what’s happening on campus and to come away with ideas that can blend leading practices to get the most value out of their investment,” says Bell.

Campuses are always looking for money and other opportunities to use their systems. They’re now taking campus card systems as a tool to branch off into other areas to provide other services.

“It’s not about selling a specific product, it’s about looking at what campuses are doing and how they’re deploying their systems.”

It’s also about coming up with out-of-the-box solutions. He cites the example of a campus that recently placed a card reader at a career counseling office. “The college uses the POS touch screen and a swipe of the student card to record that session. When campuses are evaluating operations they can see a record of how many people came in for career counseling.”

Over the years is the campus card landscape has changed. “It was primarily developed to take care of board plans, but we’re now at second and third generation,” Bell says.

Campuses are also looking at new technology and applications for cards, even though the mag stripe will persevere. “I see campuses exploring other kinds of technologies, such as with mass transit. I predicted a long time ago that mag stripes would be a thing of the past. I was clearly wrong. You need to worry less about the card and more about how it’s deployed,” Bell adds.

Bottom line? “What we have is a system that has an incredible number of functions, processing millions of transactions. It’s getting to be more and more of a reporting tool for campuses. They want to know how they’re doing, how many door accesses they’ve had, how many people are attending one of their events. It truly is well beyond what it started out to be.”

Dates: November 17 - 19, 2009
Location: Paris, France
Venue: Paris-Nord Villepinte Exhibition Center
URL: http://www.cartes.com

Description: This is the event where decisions are taken on the future directions and on major trends in smartcard and contactless technologies (transactions, telecoms, services, transport).

CARTES: The world leading show for banking technologies and e-transactions, with mobile payment and contactless in the spotlight.

IDentification: Security-related technologies and biometrics, with a focus on ID management.