Call Us : +91-9825020105

Glossary of Terms

ABS…

Acrylonitrile butadiene styrene, plastic material formed through injection molding, used for some smart cards

Access Control Card…

Magnetic or chip cards with or without photo used to enter restricted areas (e.g., ID badges)

Blank Cards…

Cards with no printing usually used in imagining machines

Chip…

A piece of silicon etched with an electronic circuit

Coercivity…

A measure of the strength of a magnetic field. Fields are expressed as low or high by the terms LoCo and HiCo

Combi-card…

Holding both contact and contactless technology on one card

Contact…

A point of electrical connection between a smart card and its external interface device

Contact Card…

Any card where information is transferred to a reader via a series of contact points located on the card

Contactless Card…

Smart card which transfers data using radio frequency technology via a transmitter and receiver.

Degaussing…

Magnetic stripe data erasure

Digitizing…

Conversion of non-textual data to digital form

EMV…

A standard or specification endorsed by Mastercard or Visa

Electronic Purse…

Smart card stored value program

Embossing…

Characters in relief on the front surface of a card

Encoding…

Recording electronic information on to a magnetic stripe

Encryption…

Transferring information based on a key to make it un-intelligible to unauthorized parties

Financial Hologram Card…

Financial cards using a hologram, 30 mil thickness, ISO cards, MasterCards/Visa and others

Financial Other…

Usually Debit, Check, Charge, or ATM cards not using a hologram

FIPS…

Federal Information Processing Standards

GSM…

Global System for Mobile Communication, a widely used digital mobile phone standard

Gift Card…

A retail prepaid card usually initiated at cash or checkout

Hologram…

A flat optical image which looks three-dimensional to the naked eye

Holographic foil…

The foil used to carry embossed holographic images

Initialization…

Programming a smart card chip with data that is the same for a batch of cards

ID Card…

Card that identifies both the bearer and the issuer. All financial transaction cards are ID cards

ISO…

International Standards Organization, Central body for formation and dissemination of industry standards for all national standards bodies.

Issuer…

An individual or organization that issues identification cards to individual or corporate cardholders

Lithography or Offset Printing…

Most common process for plastic card printing based on the concept that oil and water are not compatible. The ink represents the oil and the alkaline fountain solution represents the water. These are the two main components which must interact during the printing process, allowing the ink to adhere to the image area of a printing plate while the fountain solution repels the ink from the non-image area.

Lamination…

Using plates on a press to fuse the various layers of a plastic card together

Loyalty Card…

Usually a retail frequent user card offering promotional benefits

Magnetic Stripe (Mag Stripe)…

The strip of magnetic recording material on an ID card

Membership Card…

Usually a club member card for ID purpose

Memory Card…

Smart card that stores and retrieves serial “streams” of data that are sent to or received from the semiconductor chip

Microprocessor Card…

Contains a microprocessor chip with a microcode that defines a command structure, a data file structure and a security structure in the card

Multi-application Card…

Smart card that can handle a variety of applications.

Non-magnetic Card…

Cards without a magnetic stripe (e.g., ID cards)

Oersted…

The unit of magnetic coercive force used to define difficulty of erasing of magnetic material

Off-line…

A transaction via paper or reader not connected to a central system

On-line…

A transaction on a terminal permanently connected to a network that is on-line to the card account

Optical Card…

Card with information recorded on an optical memory stripe, similar to compact disks

Other Secure Card…

Usually Retail , Oil/Gas, Telecom, Transit, Pay TV cards

Pay TV Card…

Usually a chip card subscribing to a television service (e.g. satellite TV)

Personalization…

Printing, encoding and programming a card with data specific to an individual cardholder

PIV Card …

Personal Identity Verification Card

Prepaid Card…

A card paid for at point of sale permitting the holder to buy goods and services up to the prepaid value

Promotional Card…

A card offering special benefits to users (e.g., discount card)

Protected Memory Card…

Smart card that requires a secret code or PIN to be entered before the data can be sent to or received from the semiconductor chip

Proximity Card…

A contactless card whose presence and data can be sensed by an interface device not in physical contact with the card.

PVC…

Polyvinyl chloride, the most widely used plastic material for ID cards

Radio Frequency Card (RFID)…

A proximity card in which the coupling between the card and the interface device is by radio

Secure Card…

Cards with an intrinsic value (e.g., financial, other secure, etc.)

Screen Printing…

Method in which ink is forced through a design-bearing screen made of silk or other material onto the substrate being printed.

Signature Panel…

The area of an ID card where the cardholder enters a signature

SIM…

Subscriber Identification Module: the smart card necessary for the operation of GSM phones

Skimming…

Copying the magnetic stripe encoding from one card to another

Smart Card (aka Chip Card, IC Card)…

A plastic credit card sized card that contains one or more semiconductor chips. In the capability category, there are three types:

SET…

Secure Electronic Transaction, a MasterCard/Visa backed standard to allow safe Internet trading via encryption certification of all parties involved in a transaction

Stored Value Card (aka cash card, electronic purse, prepaid card)…

A financial card that is loaded with a certain amount of money with each purchase amount deducted from the card

Substrate…

Material upon which a plastic card is printed

Transit Card…

Magnetic or chip card used for transportation services (e.g., subway card)

Telecom Card…

Magnetic or chip card used for telephone services (e.g., GSM card, prepaid card)

Traditional Card…

A magnetic or non magnetic card not using chip card technology

UV Printing…

UV printing is used to print on plastic, foil, and specialty substrates. UV light is used to dry specially formulated inks that are printed on non-porous materials. In conventional printing, ink dries as it is absorbed into paper. Because plastic is not absorbent, the ink must be dried on the top surface using UV light.

Weigand Wire…

Magnetic media embedded in cards for access control applications