CORSAIR - A SMART CARD FOR PUBLIC KEY CRYPTOSYSTEMS

Algorithms best suited for flexible smart card applications are based on public key cryptosystems - RSA, zero-knowledge protocols ... Their practical implementation (execution in almost-equal-to second) entails a computing power beyond the reach of classical smart cards, since large,integers (512 bits) have to be manipulated in complex ways (exponentiation). CORSAIR achieves up to 40 (8 bit) MIPS with a clock speed of 6 Mhz. This allows to compute X(E) mod M, with 512 bit operands, in less than 1.5 second (0.4 sec for a signature). The new smart card is in the final design stage; the first test chips should be available by the end of 1990.