From: Patrick Breitenbach <patrickb@panix.com>
Date: Mon, 7 Mar 94 14:17:22 PST
To: cypherpunks@toad.com
Subject: Re: Mondex card
Message-ID: <199403072217.AA18242@panix2.panix.com>
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain


Recent articles on Mondex:
  The Economist, 1/29/94
  NewsBytes, "The Cashless Card: UK Banks Introduce Mondex", 1/6/94

From what I can tell:
Mondex appears to be a rather agressive attempt at an open 
system for digital cash. The three major players are NatWest,
Midland Bank and British Telecom. Unlike many other efforts,
they are using a completely anonymous method rather than
auditing all transactions. The cards are smart (IC chips embedded
on a credit card sized card. I am not sure of the security
specifics. They will be capable of representing 5 core
currencies and many more temporarily. The "Mondex" name has
been reserved in 30 countries and market research has been
done in Japan, the US, Germany and France as well as the UK.
They are piloting in the British town of Swindon (not sure of the
size). 

Other interesting moves along these lines:
  Electronic Payment Services/MAC Network are piloting prepay
  Lufthansa/German Post/2 German Banks looking at multi-app card

patrick breitenbach
patrickb@panix.com