SANTA ANA, CA and FREMONT, CA -- (Marketwire) -- 10/11/10 -- Hirsch Electronics, a leading security systems manufacturer and a business unit of Identive Group, Inc. (NASDAQ: INVE) (FRANKFURT: INV), today announced a solution utilizing what the company believes is the industry's deepest integration of physical and logical security -- a true converged security system. Hirsch's Velocity Security Management System™ simplifies the provisioning of multi-purpose smart cards and eliminates the need for a separate credential management user interface. Velocity, a multi-award winning system traditionally used for physical access control, can now issue and manage encrypted smart cards for use in information security applications such as secure Windows log-on. Demonstrations will be given at the ASIS security tradeshow in Dallas, TX, October 12-14, at Hirsch booth 2508.
The achievement is the first deliverable from a joint development project between Hirsch and ActivIdentity, a global leader in intelligent identity assurance. Both companies used the ASIS show to officially announce their partnership which was formed several months ago to develop easy-to-use converged security solutions.
"Companies increasingly want to use strong authentication for computer and network log-on, also known as 'logical access,'" commented John Guerrero, Hirsch's vice president of business solutions, "because utilizing smart card technology to advance beyond password-only log-on results in enhanced security and reduced help desk costs." Many cyber security experts recommend organizations implement stronger log-on tools, such as encrypted smart cards, to prevent hackers or criminal insiders from infiltrating networks or accessing data on stolen computers. "However, many companies do not want to deploy a standalone credential management system (CMS) to issue and manage the cards. Many would prefer a single solution that does credential management for both logical and physical security -- a converged solution. That's what Hirsch is delivering."
Velocity is Hirsch's flagship security management system that integrates access control, intrusion detection, badge printing and video surveillance. Its new capabilities enable it to acquire digital certificates from a certificate authority, expose Active Directory user and group lists for selection, encode the smart card with a trusted certificate, bind (associate) the card to the Active Directory user-ID, and do checks of the certificate's validity from the end-user's computer. Thus, users can log-on to Windows using strong authentication -- two-factors (card and PIN) plus do a check of the card's certificate status (i.e., valid versus revoked). This secure log-on reduces the likelihood of fraudulent access via keyboard loggers, brute force password crackers and counterfeit cards. Various configuration options are available to meet specific customer needs.
"ActivIdentity is proud to provide its technology as part of Hirsch's system in order to enable Velocity to provide AI credential management functionality transparently through Velocity's user interface," noted Yves Massard, ActivIdentity's senior product manager. "Velocity's ability to both talk and listen to our CMS, coupled with the programming code developed by both companies specifically for this application, results in a truly unique market offering. It's convergence on a new, deeper level."
The credential management solution addresses the needs of several departments including IT. It lets the physical security or human resources department issue a single smart card that can be used for both door and computer access. However, IT maintains its control over who goes where on the network. During card creation, the issuer must choose from the user and group lists that IT previously defined. IT need only ensure the user account exists in Active Directory. Alternatively, IT departments can choose to allow Velocity to push new users into Active Directory, such as in the case of a new employee. Additionally, IT assumes no card issuance or card management burden.
To further simplify purchase and deployment, Hirsch has bundled the solution. The package includes Velocity software, CMS, certificate authority (CA), hardware security module (HSM), client-side smart card middleware, smart cards and smart card readers.
About ActivIdentity
ActivIdentity Corporation is a global leader in strong authentication and credential management, providing solutions to confidently establish a person's identity when interacting digitally. For more than two decades the company's experience has been leveraged by security-minded organizations in banking and finance, government and enterprises of all sizes. The company's customers have issued more than 100 million credentials, securing the holder's digital identity. ActivIdentity is headquartered in Silicon Valley, California. For more information, visit www.actividentity.com.
About Hirsch Electronics
Hirsch, a business unit of Identive Group (NASDAQ: INVE) (FRANKFURT: INV), manufactures integrated security and identity systems for worldwide markets. Hirsch's award-winning solutions bring together access control, video surveillance, intrusion detection, digital certificates, smart cards and biometrics in order to successfully secure facilities, digital assets and electronic transactions. Identive Group, Inc. is a leading provider of products, services and solutions for the security, identification and RFID industries. For more information, please visit www.HirschElectronics.com and www.identive-group.com.
Images, company names and brand names herein are trademarks or registered trademarks of their respective companies or its affiliates in the United States and certain other countries.
Image Available: http://www2.marketwire.com/mw/frame_mw?attachid=1386624
Add to Digg Bookmark with del.icio.us Add to Newsvine
CONTACT:
Hirsch Electronics
Scott Howell
949-250-8888 ext. 130
marketing@hirschelectronics.com
ActivIdentity
Donna Candelori
Director, Corp. Marketing
1.510.574.1783
dcandelori@actividentity.com