Tiny Fruit Heights, population 1,500, is poised to set a technology first in the United States.
On July 16, residents will get their hands on the first multiple-application smart card, offered by IC One of Utah. They can credit money to the card and use it instead of cash for purchases at various Kaysville stores.With each buy, they'll accumulate "IC Ones," bonus credits they can spend as they like.
A thumbnail-size microprocessor embedded in the card will track both the real-cash totals and the credits, making sure they remain separate.
But that's only a fraction of the power packed into IC One's "electronic wallet," which is the same size as a credit card.
The card's 8 kilobyte microprocessor has the ability to handle up to 50 different applications, each kept secure and private from the others. It has the potential to consolidate all those cards in your wallet - driver's license, library, department store, medical, etc. - into one single card.
"The only thing we haven't figured out is how to store pictures of my family on the card," said Jim Biorge, IC One chairman.
With the Fruit Heights debut of IC One's card, Utah will move to the forefront of the smart-card revolution that will sweep the United States over the next year.
Businesses testing various incarnations of smart cards range from auto dealers to airlines to banks. One of the most public trials of the first generation of smart cards in the United States will take place at the Summer Olympic Games in Atlanta.
NationsBank, Wachovia Bank and First Union Corp. offer Visa cash cards. Two varieties are available: disposable cards with a predetermined value (like a phone card) and, for bank customers, reloadable cards that can be credited with cash as needed.
Each card contains a microprocessor chip that stores value and automatically deducts purchases as they are made. Unlike single-purpose cards, like prepaid phone cards or college ID cards that can be charged with value, the cash cards can be used at any store that will accept them.
A second major trial of stored-value smart cards will take place this fall in Manhattan. MasterCard, Visa, Citibank and Chase Manhattan plan to issue electronic cash cards that store up to $20.
"Whatever industry you take a cross section of, they are all in the developmental stages of smart cards," said Bob Gilson, executive director of the Smart Card Forum. "Within a year to a year and a half, these pilots will be rolling into full-fledged programs."
Meanwhile, Utah's smart-card experiment will be off and running. If all goes well in Fruit Heights, IC One plans to issue cards in other communities, beginning with Salt Lake City in August.
While IC One knows the card works, the company isn't sure how it will be received by consumers.
The company got a good response to a small-scale experiment with its card in February. It handed out 300 Centennial edition smart cards to legislators, state government workers and members of the Smart Card Forum, which held its annual meeting in Utah this winter. The card was valid in the Capitol cafeteria and at a handful of local stores.
The privately held company had good reason to choose Fruit Heights for the public introduction of its multiple-application card: The community has the highest income per capita in the state. Also, Kaysville merchants gave the project their support in hopes of luring Fruit Heights residents to shop closer to home.
IC One, which is supplying merchants with card readers, will make a small percentage on purchases made with the bonus credits.
IC One developed the technology that allows the chip to segregate different applications on one card. Although it won't be used, IC One plans to load dummy driver's license information into each card issued in Fruit Heights as a test of the card's privacy and security.
The ability to ensure privacy and security is a necessity if government/private sector partnerships, like that planned by the driver's license division, are to take hold.
"The public has to be convinced there is security and that when you have multiple pieces of information on a card that somebody else can't get to them," Gilson said.
Government doesn't want the bank reading your driver's license information, and the bank doesn't want government reading your financial information, Biorge said.
IC One uses encryption and authentication features to secure and segregate applications on its cards.
Users will need a personal identification number to access information stored on the card or to make purchases with it. Businesses or agencies also need the right code to access the application on the card that pertains to them. Both features protect the card from fraudulent use.
"In the 15 years smart cards have been an industry, nobody has figured out how to break the codes," Biorge said.