Spencer Marshall, pictured, regional sales manager – Northern Europe, at HID Global offers an overview of multi-technology readers.
Multi-technology readers – that use a combination of old, low frequency and new, high frequency technologies, including 125 kHz HID Prox or magstripe, as well as the latest RFID [radio frequency] – increase flexibility, enabling an organisation to develop an access control migration plan that serves its unique requirements. Organisations that want to upgrade from low to high frequency smartcards, for example, can replace all of their low frequency readers with combination low and high frequency readers. Then, rather than switching out all of the cards at once, smartcards can be issued to new employees and as replacements for lost cards with existing employees. This will offset the cost of swapping out all of the cards at once. The organisation can then replace all of its low frequency cards with high frequency cards after a transition period, and by then the cost impact will be lower because many of the employees will have the new cards already.
In terms of deployment, it should be remembered that all security solutions depend on the needs of the user. For example, an organisation with buildings protected primarily by low frequency cards could issue a combination high and low frequency cards to executives, IT professionals or others who need access to more sensitive areas. The low frequency readers can remain at all the standard building entrances, but a high frequency, multi-technology reader (possibly with biometrics) can be installed at the entrance to a secure laboratory within the building.
Protocols
Readers need to be able to support a number of protocols. One recently established standard that delivers significant user benefits is the Open Supervised Device Protocol (OSDP) with Secure Channel Protocol (SCP). This specification provides bi-directional communications and security features for connecting card readers to control panels or other security management systems, which improves integration to support advanced applications and data encryption between components.
There is no standard protocol for interfacing readers to physical access control systems, other than the Wiegand protocol, which does not support advanced operations such as those required for public key infrastructure (PKI). The addition of SCP to OSDP has brought strong authentication capabilities that enable secure and trusted communications and connections.
That said, some organisations must ensure they comply with government physical access control mandates. For example, our pivCLASS suite of contact, contactless and biometric readers offer a complete solution for end-to-end compliance with Homeland Security Presidential Directive -12 (HSPD-12), NIST SP 800-116 guidelines and FIPS 201 to PIV-enable a physical access control system (PACS).
Selecting
For organisations looking to ensure that their readers are fit for purpose, it is important to make sure that the correct technology is chosen to match the desired level of access control security. Using a good-better-best grading system will help make the correct choice easier. Recognising that there are many legacy card technologies still in use, considering these best-practices will raise the level of security of an installation regardless of the card technology employed. Some questions to ask include: do readers have a tamper detect mechanism that provides a signal when the reader has been removed from the wall? Best practice would be to immediately investigate tamper alarms, even if they are momentary and return to normal. Can they send ‘health’ messages – also referred to as ‘heartbeat’ or ‘I am Alive’ messages – on a periodic basis to the upstream device? This functionality can be used to detect when the wires are cut and does not require any additional wires to get this protection. Monitoring health messages also provides additional benefits since they will detect reader malfunctions. It is better to know when a reader is not working before somebody complains — usually in the middle of the night when they can’t get in the door!
Looking to the future
Contactless smartcards are fast becoming the technology of choice for access control applications. Security, convenience, and interoperability are the three major reasons for this growth. Equally, mobile access control using smartphones is also on its way, which will leverage these devices’ wireless connection to act as both the key and processor, and become the rules engine for making access control decisions. As such, readers that are capable of supporting an ever-expanding universe of multiple credential technologies are essential to ensure seamless access control system migration and are field programmable for secure upgrades.
