NDS has won a contract to set up a conditional access system for cable operator Madritel of Spain. Madritel operates fiber optic integrated telecommunications services on one of Europe's most advanced digital cable networks.
NDS's conditional access system VideoGuard will be installed in Madritel's digital cable network broadcasting system, and in digital switches in subscribers' homes.
The system will enable Madritel to offer subscribers advanced services through personlized smart card access. These digital services will include Internet surfing, information, distance learning, remote work, surveillance and audio visual content transmission.
They will also include a bulletin of emergency services and allow for pay per view and video on demand. NDS set up a similar system, the first of its kind in the world, for Israeli cable company Matav. NDS won the Spanish project immediately after completing system installation at Matav.;
NDS has been invited to take part in access security via smart cards stage II testing of e-commerce conducted by the US federal government.
The US government has already completed stage I of the tests, conducted by CommerceNet, the US e-commerce organization. The tests involved 14 federal government agencies, government suppliers and customers.
Through the tests, the US government seeks to set a standard for secure online e-commerce at a high level, to encourage deployment of similar e-commerce networks throughout the US. NDS participated in stage I of the testing, and was invited to stage II as well, recently started.
NDS's security product used by the US government in the tests is a secure smart card, designed to serve as the main personal authentication tool for users of the federal e-commerce network. In contrast to the protection method of television broadcasts, where the encoding is only one-directional, from the broadcaster to the recipient subscriber, e-commerce requires the same card to encode and decode two-way broadcasts: to and from the subscriber using his PC.
Published by Israel's Business Arena on September 6, 1999