News

Morpho joins Open Standard for Public Transport Alliance

April 14, 2014

Morpho, a provider of biometric security and smart card technology, has joined the Open Standard for Public Transport Alliance as a full member. The OSPT Alliance's goal is to help technology companies move toward open standards for ticketing platforms and transit fare collection systems.

"Morpho's track record of innovation and extensive experience in multiservice ticketing solutions make it a valuable addition to our membership," Laurent Cremer, the OSPT Alliance's executive director, said in a statement. "We're delighted to work with them on open standards projects."

Morpho is a subsidiary of Safran, an international technology group that focuses on aerospace, defense and security. It develops identification solutions that are used by the police or border control agencies; e-documents such as passports, ID cards and drivers' licenses; and detection solutions that are used for transportation, for example in airports. The company has a key focus on biometric terminals for identification or access management.

Morpho has installed its biometric security systems and self-service identification kiosks in more than 100 countries. For example, Morpho's U.S. subsidiary, MorphoTrust USA, has installed self-service kiosks in Tennessee for the Tennessee Department of Safety and Homeland Security that allow people to renew and replace driver licenses and ID cards.

"Security will only continue to grow in importance," Paolo Villasco, vice president and general manager of the Banking Business Unit within Morpho's Business Solutions Division, said in a statement. "We expect open standards to result in flexible, cost-effective solutions that can adapt as threats evolve over time. At the same time, we can improve convenience for users and more operational benefits for transit customers."

The OSPT Alliance offers the CIPURSE open security standard to address transit authorities' need for future-proof fare collection systems with advanced security. As an open standard, CIPURSE promotes vendor neutrality and cross-vendor system interoperability with reduced technology adoption risks, higher quality and improved market responsiveness, which can result in lower operating costs and greater flexibility for transport system operators. CIPURSE also offers a global basis for migrating transit fare systems to NFC-enabled mobile devices, and the standard supports the adoption of NFC transit applications for a future-proof solution, the OSPT Alliance said.