Denver school goes contactless with Multicard
14 June, 2012
category: Contactless, Education, Smart Cards
Multicard, a business unit of Identive Group Inc. announced it is implementing a new, secure identity card platform for the Auraria Higher Education Center (AHEC) Campus in Denver.
The new contactless smart cards initially will be utilized within the campus’s existing door access system. Students with a campus bank account can also use the IDs as a Visa debit card. The new ID cards are based on open standards technology, enabling them to be integrated with additional applications for student services over time.
Other applications planned for the cards include parking, meal payment, library checkout, event management and various tracking capabilities for lab and recreational center use as well as emergency incidents.
The AHEC Campus is located in the heart of the Denver Metro area, hosting three separate educational institutions: the Community College of Denver, Metropolitan State College of Denver and the University of Colorado-Denver. The campus serves more than 45,000 students, faculty and staff on an annual basis. A number of shared services exist on the joint campus, including the central issuance of institution-specific identity cards to all students and faculty.
Multicard has provided the AHEC campus with card personalization systems for a number of years to provide physical access to campus facilities. AHEC contracted with Multicard to upgrade the existing campus identification card system, so that they would have the option of encoding contactless smart cards for use alongside their existing magnetic stripe cards.
Multicard began with developing secure encryption key technology for AHEC to prevent hacking attempts, and later upgraded the campus’s existing printers to encode both smart card stock and magnetic stripe card stock, allowing the campus to migrate to chip-based ID cards over time.