PARIS--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Gemalto (Euronext NL0000400653 GTO), the world leader in digital security, today announced an industry milestone in Canada: its Optelio dual interface debit card is the first to be certified as compliant with the Interac Flash specification. The card contains both contactless and contact payment functionality to add more security and convenience to the payment process in Canada. Gemalto’s Interac Flash-compliant debit card is ready and available for commercial deployment.

Interac Flash, the new contactless enhancement of Interac^® Direct Payment, increases the functionality of Interac branded debit cards by leveraging dual interface microprocessors that give cardholders the ability to carry out a point-of-sale debit transaction using the contact or contactless feature of the card. The dual-interface card builds on the security of global EMV^™ standards being adopted across Canada.

“Gemalto is dedicated to providing its customers with the most flexible payment solutions,” said Jack Jania, Vice President and General Manager of Secure Transactions, Gemalto North America. “We see this certification of our latest innovation as another step in our ongoing commitment to support the Canadian marketplace through its migration to full EMV implementation, including contactless.”

“We’re pleased that Gemalto has met all of Interac Association’s certification requirements to provide dual interface debit cards,” said Allen Wright, VP Products, Interac Association. “Gemalto’s certification provides the support required as we move closer to national roll out of INTERAC Flash.”

Gemalto’s Optelio dual interface debit card technology is compliant with both ISO 14443 contactless and ISO 7816 contact protocols, and meets all requirements set forth by the Interac Flash specification. This new application complements Gemalto’s extensive portfolio, which includes notably American Express, China Union Pay (CUP), Japan Credit Bank (JCB), MasterCard and Visa.

At the end of November 2010, Gemalto had already delivered 50 million dual interface EMV cards in 30 countries.

For more information on Gemalto’s complete range of financial services offerings, visit http://www.gemalto.com/financial.

Visit the Gemalto stand - 3E002 - at CARTES & IDentification, 7/8/9 December 2010.

® Interac and Interac Flash are trade-marks of Interac Inc.

EMV^TM is a registered trademark owned by EMVCo. LLC.

About Gemalto

Gemalto (Euronext NL 0000400653 GTO) is the world leader in digital security with 2009 annual revenues of €1.65 billion, and over 10,000 employees operating out of 75 offices, with research and service centers in 41 countries.

Gemalto is at the heart of our evolving digital society. The freedom to communicate, travel, shop, bank, entertain, and work—anytime, anywhere—has become an integral part of what people want and expect, in ways that are convenient, enjoyable and secure.

Gemalto delivers on the growing demands of billions of people worldwide for mobile connectivity, identity and data protection, credit card safety, health and transportation services, e-government and national security. We do this by supplying to governments, wireless operators, banks and enterprises a wide range of secure personal devices, such as subscriber identification modules (SIM), Universal Integrated Circuit Card (UICC) in mobile phones, smart banking cards, smart card access badges, electronic passports, and USB tokens for online identity protection. Moreover Gemalto delivers on emerging applications related to the ‘Internet of things’ by supplying wireless modules and machine identification modules (MIM) for machine-to-machine communication. To complete these solutions we also provide software, systems and services to help our customers achieve their goals.

As the use of Gemalto’s software and secure devices increases with the number of people interacting in the digital and wireless world, the company is poised to thrive over the coming years.

For more information please visit www.gemalto.com.