2 About PIV

In August 2004 the White House issued Homeland Security Presidential Directive 12 (HSPD-12), stating a need for a common identification standard for federal employees and contractors.

It further specified secure and reliable identification that:

• Is issued based on sound criteria for verifying an individual employee’s identity

• Is strongly resistant to identity fraud, tampering, counterfeiting, and terrorist exploitation

• Can be rapidly authenticated electronically

• Is issued only by providers whose reliability has been established by an official accreditation process.

In response to HSPD-12, the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) produced Federal Information Processing Standards publication 201 (FIPS 201).

FIPS 201 specifies both the technical and process requirements a system must meet in order to issue a valid Personal Identity Verification (PIV) card.

FIPS 201 refers to various ‘Special Publications’ which detail specific elements of the overall solution; for example:

• SP 800-73 (card interface and data model)

• SP 800-76 (biometric specification)