OSPT Alliance Launches its Certification Program for the Latest CIPURSE™ Standard
Program advancements include qualification of CIPURSE products that will support multiple proximity system environment functionality
18 June 2014 – Industry body, the Open Standard for Public Transport (OSPT) Alliance has advanced its certification program to qualify products that meet its recently published CIPURSE™ standard version 2 revision 2, which includes the recently defined universal multiple proximity system environment. KEOLABS, an ISO/IEC 17025 v 2005 certified provider of tools and services for testing smart cards and secure components, is exclusively providing third-party conformance certification, as well as testing tools for in-house pre-certification.
The OSPT Alliance certification program provides transport authorities with confidence that CIPURSE products are compatible with the transport and ticketing ecosystems. The program has significantly been advanced to test that products are compliant to the latest version of the CIPURSE specification, an advanced foundation for developing interoperable fare collection systems. A key enhancement of this revision is the industry’s first multiple proximity system environment, which enables access control terminals to better identify and connect with the required application on a secure-chip to authorize access.
The certification program will test all consumer products that are compliant to CIPURSE including different form factors such as limited use tickets, plastic cards, stickers, key fobs and near field communication (NFC) smartphones for native or Java based products.
“To create an open environment in any industry you need to have confidence that all products will be compatible once live in the field,” explains Laurent Cremer, Executive Director of OSPT Alliance. “While time is being taken to develop the open standards needed by the transportation and ticketing market to create a secure, sustainable and flexible infrastructure that encourages public private investments and meets the increasing needs of consumers, this would fail its essential purpose without a third party certification process.
“By using independent product certifications, we are giving the market ultimate reassurances that CIPURSE certified products will deliver the functionality of the standard accurately and successfully. The expert contribution of KEOLABS has been instrumental in achieving these latest advancements.”
While market interoperability is key, Laurent adds that the alliance also wants to be as transparent as possible. He comments: “Our aim is to promote an open and accessible testing framework so that stakeholders can view the test suites, purchase test tools for in-house testing and engage directly with the laboratory. This is something that has not previously been available within the transport industry, but is needed if we are to drive more public private partnerships and deliver the most innovative services to consumers.”
OSPT Alliance members are currently working to submit and certify their products, which once qualified will be published on the OSPT Alliance website.
About the OSPT Alliance
The OSPT Alliance is an international association chartered to provide a new open standard for secure transit fare collection solutions. It provides industry education, creates workgroup opportunities and catalyzes the development and adoption of innovative fare collection technologies, applications and services. The OSPT Alliance was founded by leading technology companies, and membership is open to technology providers, transit operators, consultants, solution vendors, government agencies and other stakeholders in the transit ecosystem. For additional information, please visit www.osptalliance.org.
