Further expansion of LEGIC’s “One Reader Design” strategy
LEGIC pursues a “One Reader Design” strategy that allows Reader OEMs to create a minimal number of reader variants that support as many smartcard standards as possible. This allows OEMs to save on design, manufacturing and logistics costs while supporting a wide range of both new as well as legacy installations in the field. The recent addition of iCLASS® is an example.
With this OS50 V1.7 firmware release, additional possibilities within the command set are created to enable the LEGIC 6000 series to be used as a frontend for even more smartcards:
- The addition of the ISO14443A layer 3 bit-stream mode now makes it possible to support MIFARE Classic smartcards with cryptographic keys supplied in an external SE (e.g. MIFARE SAM).
- It is now possible to personalize the use of MIFARE Classic EV1 7 byte UID smartcards, e.g. UID mapping from 7 byte UID to 4 byte NUID.
- The ENVELOPE command has been extended to enable an external SE to provide cryptographic keys for HID iCLASS smartcards. This closes a gap in our HID smartcard compatibility by allowing the use of HID iCLASS Elite smartcards.
Bluetooth Beaconing
With this OS50 V1.7 firmware release, Bluetooth beaconing is supported via a new command called BLE_BEACON. This allows the LEGIC 6000 series security modules to act as a fully customizable beacon: advertising data, transmission intervals, power and even scan response data can be set to customer requirements. The command does not specify that any specific protocol must be used. Customers are free to choose but must specify their payload according to the intended application. Note that this is not a Mobile SDK feature as the beacon signals are interpreted by your mobile app, not the LEGIC Mobile SDK.
There are several useful applications for Bluetooth beacons in general, for example:
- Advertizing: display push notifications based on a specific location (next to a shop window for example)
- Indoor positioning: with the lack of GPS indoors, beacons can be used to give approximations of a user’s position in a building (which floor in a park house, for example)
- Optimized interaction: initialize interaction between infrastructure and people (infrastructure sending out beaconing signals to a user’s smartphone to initiate user interaction as supported by your mobile app)
I2C added to host interface
In order to control the SM-6300 or SM-6310 as a slave device, an interface to an external host microcontroller is necessary. With the OS50 OS V1.7 update, LEGIC 6000 series Security Modules also support the two-wire I2C bus as host interface in addition to UART and SPI. This new host interface allows customers to easily integrate the LEGIC 6000 series Security Modules into existing I2C designs.
I2C is a well-defined and industry accepted protocol that implements auto-synchronization of clock speeds, efficient support of up to 128 slave devices using only two bus lines (no Chip Select required), and built-in recognition of connected slave devices. A large number of I2C peripheral ICs are available from many major semiconductor vendors including display drivers, real-time clocks, non-volatile memories, ADCs and DACs, clock generators, temperature sensors and GPIOs.
Further information
Martin Buck
Head of Product Management
LEGIC Identsystems Ltd
Tel: +41 44 933 64 64
martin.buck@legic.com
Press inquiries
Carl Fenger
Technical Communications Manager
LEGIC Identsystems Ltd
Tel: +41 44 933 64 64
carl.fenger@legic.com