Hewlett-Packard last week added smart cards to its menu of network security offerings for large customers. MasterCard's purchase last fall of 51 percent of Mondex will also help make smart cards more ubiquitous, as well as hastening the emergence of a single smart card standard instead of the 35 varieties now out there. You've heard this before, probably every year for the last decade.
Smart cards are the next big thing.
But it's different now, and here's why. For big companies, smart cards are a cheap way to better security, not just for their computer networks but to protect their physical premises. Instead of that security badge you wear at the office and your key, one smart card can give you access to corporate data and get you through a locked door. For consumer Internet transactions, putting electronic cash on a smart card can solve the problem of how you buy stuff for few dollars or pennies. Credit cards aren't an economic option for small purchases on the Net because of the cost of processing a tiny transaction.