Contact chip cards

What are chip cards?

The most common type of chip cards are contact chip cards, the data on these cards is written onto, and read from, a chip. This type of chip card is usually used in situations and industries where data needs to be saved and accessed quickly, for example, the healthcare sector.

Contact chip cards are different to RFID chip cards as physical contact is needed to read and write data for the RFID cards.

Memory chips can store between 256Bytes and 64kBytes. Some types of chips have additional protection written into them, this means that they can be used for cards that hold information that needs to be more secure such as loyalty or prepaid cards.

Processor chips have a built-in data processor. The chip is encrypted ensuring that the card is secure and only authorised people can access the data.

One of the advantages of using specific access solutions is that it makes it possible to use the cards as SIM or bank cards.