Registers – Coded record sensors – Particular sensor structure
Reexamination Certificate
2003-10-01
2004-12-28
Paik, Steven S. (Department: 2876)
Registers
Coded record sensors
Particular sensor structure
C235S492000, C235S379000, C235S380000, C235S382000, C235S487000, C235S375000
Reexamination Certificate
active
06834802
ABSTRACT:
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
The present invention relates to a method of loading an application program into a smart card, to smart cards, to a method of loading scripts into a smart card, a terminal device capable of operating with smart cards, and to a storage medium holding an application program; and, more particularly, the invention relates to a computer system with highly-reliable security, especially, to a system having its kernel built on an IC card, wherein an application program stored into its nonvolatile storage can run inside the card.
IC cards (termed smart cards) furnished with a built-in CPU (Central Processing Unit) that enables operations to be carried out inside the card are expected to be used in various application fields, particularly, in financial applications, such as the those involving electronic money, and their introduction into use has been advancing positively in late years because of their information storage capability and their highly-reliable security characteristics.
Recently, operating systems (OSs) for such cards, enabling the safe coexistence of multiple applications on a single card, have been generally used. Examples of these OSs for such cards, that support multiple applications on the card, include “MULTOS” supplied by Mondex International and “Java Card” (TM) supplied by Sun Microsystems, Inc. Smart cards with this kind of multi-application OS are controlled so that the application programs installed on the card will be highly independent of each other when running. Not only can a plurality of programs safely coexist on these cards, but also a new application can be added to these cards after a card is issued, or an unnecessary application program can be removed from them. Thus, these cards can be regarded as safe computers, rather than as simple information storage devices. From the viewpoint of active use of their highly-reliable security feature, or as new cards that supercede the conventional magnetic card function, smart cards are expected to have applications in the financial field, such as credit cards or electronic money, especially, as an implementation of the interlinking of a plurality of applications.
Conventionally, a point system or a customer-loyalty system (hereinafter referred to as a point system) has been generally used as a means of getting more customers. This system is defined as “a system in which a customer's points increase by the use of the customer IC card and the customer can be granted a predetermined service according to the accumulated points.” On the basis that customers expect to be granted some privilege by getting points, shop managers and card issuers aim at the effect of promotion in the use of cards for shopping at their shops. Examples of such a system are stamp cards that are valid only in a shopping district, department stores point systems, or airlines' mileage programs. As one example, a department stores point system will be explained below. Customer members have their cards issued from the department store. Whenever a member as a customer makes a purchase at the store and presents his or her card to the clerk, the customer gets points according to how much he or she paid (for example, 20 points are added per each ten dollars of payment) and the points are accumulated and recorded in the customer's purchase log. When a predetermined amount of points have been accumulated, the customer can exchange the points for a gift certificate. For example, the customer can exchange 1,000 points for a gift certificate of ten dollars. In other words, customers who are members of the program gain by a discount rate that is ten dollars per purchase amount of five hundred dollars, according to the calculation in this case. Department stores may offer an additional discount in such a manner that the points are added at a double rate during a special holiday period or if the amount a customer has paid for a purchase or service at the department store per year reaches a certain amount, his or her discount rate rises. In this way, department stores usually stimulate the desire for a customer to buy more.
For airlines' mileage programs, as another example, the flight distance of travel per customer instead of the amount the customer has paid is accumulated. In a system of this kind, if the total distance that a customer has traveled by using an airline reaches a predetermined flight distance, the airline grants the customer some privilege, such as a free airline ticket or a seat upgrading. In this case, similarly, the airline offers a service in accordance with the log of a customer who has used the airline, thereby motivating customers to select the same airline again. By installing such a point system on a smart card, points of the card user can be correctly managed by means of the card. For a smart card with a multi-application OS, linking with electronic money or with credit card facilities can make use of the point system more effectively.
As one application that utilizes the feature of the above-described smart card supporting the compatibility of multiple applications, a “point system with a game on smart cards” has been proposed. In this system, a game program is integrated with a point system on the card and the point value may increase according to the result of the game stored in the card. Patents regarding this system were applied for in Japanese Patent Application No. Hei 10-239812 and Japanese Patent Application No. Hei 10-321684. In this system, the count of user-playable games is defined as “rights to play a game”, and a method in which the smart card program can implement a game application safely by managing the rights to play a game and the points given as a result of playing the games has been proposed.
Moreover, another system in which a plurality of specific programs can be incorporated into a point management program has been propose as a method of managing a point system on smart cards. A patent regarding this system was applied for in Japanese Patent Application No. Hei 10-307216. According to this method, by embedding shop-specific programs into the point management program, points from a plurality of shops can be managed on a shop-by-shop basis by running a single program of point application.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
The multi-application smart card OSs such as “MULTOS; have a predetermined loading mechanism in view of security. The loading mechanism is used to check that the downloaded application is not falsified, that an authorized programmer has programmed the application, and that the card is granted the necessary permission to download the application program. For example, checking to see whether the application program is falsified is performed as follows. As signature data, a hash value of the application program, encrypted in the secret-key crypt system of the Certificate Authority (CA) is attached to the application program. This hash value as the signature is compared with a hash value recalculated on the card for a match and thereby verification can be performed. Checking the above matters is important, since the safety of the smart card is dependent on these procedures. Thus, a strict procedure for each card type is prescribed and the mechanism is designed so that the application program transferred to the card cannot be downloaded unless it is coded in a predetermined data format. This regulation is called an “application issue scheme.”
Accordingly, in order to load an application program into a smart card in which the multi-application OS is installed, a predetermined application authentication and registration procedure must be carried out, according to the above application issue is scheme. Consequently, the actual operation of replacing an application program installed op the card by another program requires considerable time and labor, though this is, in principle, possible after the card is issued. This is inevitable for maintaining the safety of the smart card. Notwithstanding, this problem is not considered significant for ordinary financial a
Mishina Yusuke
Ohki Masaru
Sukeda Hiroko
Antonelli Terry Stout & Kraus LLP
Hitachi , Ltd.
Paik Steven S.
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