New Wave Banking: It's Finally Happened
Bank of America announced in early January 1999, that it has combined the technological elements most talked about in today's banking world: online banking, biometrics and smart cards.
It has initiated a fingerprint-based smart card biometrics program that provides access to online banking services.
Read instructions carefully!
Users first store their online banking log-in identification codes, passcodes and fingerprint readings on chips attached to Bank of America multi-purpose smart cards.
Then they;
- access a special Web page created for logging in smart card users and insert their cards into portable smart card readers;
- insert the reader devices into their computers' diskette drives;
- place their fingers on a small scanning device attached to the PCs, which matches up with the prints on the cards.
A match of the fingerprints unlocks the chip containing a participant's online banking login ID and passcode, which automatically launches the user onto another special Bank of America Web page.
He or she can now transfer value from a checking account onto the Visa cash stored value application on the smart card.
The card then can be used for purchases with participating merchants in the physical and virtual worlds.
Limited number of users
The bank announcement said it is offering the program to a "limited number of associates" but didn't define who they were. Bill Gates is probably one of them!
Copyright © 1999 Bankers' Hotline. Originally appeared in Bankers' Hotline, Vol. 9, No. 2, 2/99
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