NW_20020313_en_Huge Market Opens for VASCO's Strong Authentication Products by Making Digipass Pro 800 Available for Europay-Mastercard EMV Chip Cards
HANOVER, Germany, March 13 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- CeBIT -- VASCO Data Security International (Nasdaq: VDSI, Nasdaq Europe) (www.vasco.com), a global provider of enterprise-wide security products that support e-business and e-commerce, today announced that it's award winning and commercially successful Digipass Pro 800 is available for usage with EMV cards. EMV is the leading standard chip protocol used by e.g. Europay-Mastercard. Digipass 800 Pro for EMV will be the authentication solution offered to worldwide financial institutions as a part of Europay-Mastercards' ``Chip Authentication Program''.
Digipass 800 has the strongest track record for a reliable authentication device incorporating a chip reader, with over 800,000 units sold worldwide. The availability of Digipass Pro 800 for EMV (Europay-Mastercard-VISA) opens a huge worldwide market for VASCO. EMV is believed to become the global standard for payment cards by the end of 2005. In important European countries such as the UK, millions of chip cards are already compliant with EMV. Germany will follow shortly.
The Chip Authentication Program by Europay-Mastercard offers numerous advantages for banks, e-merchants and cardholders. An important advantage for the banks is the fact that the program offers a single, global means to access all remote channels in a secure way, by offering secure authenticated access to e- and m-commerce & e- and m-banking, whilst the EMV standard and the Digipass products have a proven track record. Merchants now have at their disposal a safe means of doing e-business, in line with UCAF (Universal Cardholder Authentication Field), the worldwide standard for secure authentication, and in line with the MasterCard Guaranteed Transactions model. Cardholders win a single access method towards all banking services, without having to change the way they interact with their bank.
``Both VASCO and Europay-Mastercard strive towards the same goal: to secure the trust and the value of their customers'' says Jan Valcke, VASCO's executive Vice President for Sales and Marketing. ``VASCO is delighted to be able to contribute to Mastercards' Chip Authentication Program. Our Digipass 800 has been ready for some time, and is already used by over 800 000 customers as we speak. Together with Mastercard, we will make e-banking, e-commerce and m-commerce transactions via chip cards much more secure whilst keeping it extremely user friendly.''
``It is a pleasure working together with VASCO and to help deploy Chip authentication solutions to our members,'' said Pascal Dufour, Head of New Products development at MasterCard International. ``Europay and MasterCard is paving the way in developing multi-channel secure authentication and payment services that enable our Member banks to improve their business efficiency and offer better services and convenience to today's consumer. By leveraging existing EMV Chip cards and thanks to the industry, banks can now clearly answer most of their challenges in the virtual world. Once again, this demonstrates the added-value of Chip cards and the commitment of MasterCard to its Member banks.''
About Europay International
Europay International, headquartered in Waterloo, Belgium, is Europe's leading payments organization, dedicated to providing a tailored product range and support services to its more than 9,000 Member banks. At present, almost 262 million cards (Eurocard-MasterCard, Maestro, Cirrus and Eurocheque) provide European and global debit and credit card services, and offer cash access to Europe's largest network of more than 264,000 ATMs in 41 countries. Through its alliance with MasterCard International, over 580,000 ATMs and more than 19 million retail locations worldwide accept Europay products. Europay's website gives a detailed view on the company's products and services and shows how Europay offers its Member banks both support and leadership on issues including virtual commerce, chip technology, security & risk management, and the advent of the euro.
About VASCO
VASCO secures the enterprise from the mainframe to the Internet with infrastructure solutions that enable secure e-business and e-commerce, protect sensitive information, and safeguard the identity of users. The Company's family of Digipass® and VACMAN® products offers end-to-end security through strong authentication, digital signature, network Single Sign-On, and Radius, LAN and Web security, while sharply reducing the time and effort required to deploy and manage security. VASCO's customers include hundreds of financial institutions, blue-chip corporations, and government agencies in more than 50 countries. More information is available at www.vasco.com .
Forward Looking Statements
Statements made in this news release that relate to future plans, events or performances are forward-looking statements. Any statement containing words such as ``believes,'' ``anticipates,'' ``plans,'' ``expects,'' and similar words, is forward-looking, and these statements involve risks and uncertainties and are based on current expectations. Consequently, actual results could differ materially from the expectations expressed in these forward-looking statements.
Reference is made to the Company's public filings with the US Securities and Exchange Commission for further information regarding the Company and its operations.