CORSAIR: A SMART Card for Public Key Cryptosystems

Algorithms best suited for flexible smart card applications are based on public key cryptosystems -- RSA, zero-knowledge protocols ... Their practical implementation (execution in ? 1 second) entails a computing power beyond the reach of classical smart cards, since large integers (512 bits) have to be manipulated in complex ways (exponentiation). CORSAIR achieves up to 40 (8 bit) MIPS with a clock speed of 6 Mhz. This allows to compute XE mod M, with 512 bit operands, in less than 1.5 second (0.4 sec for a signature). The new smart card is in the final design stage; the first test chips should be available by the end of 1990.