HID GLOBAL, announced that the company and its parent, ASSA ABLOY, have been notified by the United States Patent Office that their patent, US 2008/0163361, titled “Method and Apparatus for Making a Decision on a Card,” has been allowed and will issue shortly. This invention covers the use of portable credentials in a secure access network, in which the access decision can be made within a portable credential (such as the secure element of a mobile device) using data and algorithms stored within the credential.
The patent complements an earlier patent, US 7,706,778, titled “System and Method for Remotely Assigning and Revoking Access Credentials Using a Near Field Communication Equipped Mobile Phone,” which issued last year. Both patents are part of HID Global’s rapidly growing investment in developing mobile access solutions using Near Field Communications (NFC) technology. ASSA ABLOY’s and HID Global’s patent portfolio currently consists of over 500 issued worldwide patents and over 300 pending patent applications plus foreign patents and applications. The portfolio also includes IP from the company’s recent acquisitions of Lasercard and Actividentity, as well as ActivIdentity’s earlier acquisition of Corestreet, whose patent portfolio is also heavily oriented towards physical and logical access control. This extensive patent portfolio addresses almost every major door, lock and access control market.
