Smart Cards That Actually Are Smart

(Mis)Uses of Technology

from the well,-it's-about-time dept

For all the talk of “smart cards”, in many cases, they’ve just been glorified credit or debit cards that contain the details on the card, rather than on a server somewhere. Now, finally, people seem to be getting around to adding real “smarts” to smart cards. They’re talking about doing things like setting up rules and limitations for cards, so you can give your kids a smart card that has a spending limit, or give an employee a card that can only work with authorized vendors. That, of course, is just a simple first step (mostly focused on limiting users, not adding more options). As people start to get used to those applications they’ll be able to do a lot more and the smart cards will finally seem smart.