Lockstep Technologies’ Stepwise radically enhances privacy, security and safety for consumers transacting on the Internet. Stepwise uses smartcards and similar personal security devices to de-identify highly sensitive transactions, such as e-health record entries, welfare entitlements and payments instructions, e-voting and so on.

Stepwise encapsulates customer reference numbers, identifiers, biometric templates or any other personal ID data, and seals them crypto-graphically into a smartcard. It isolates each identifier, removes all extraneous personal detail and linkages, and puts all identifiers back under the sole control of the consumer. Stepwise ensures that when any identifier is presented online, we know that it’s legitimate, it comes from a genuine smartcard, and that it’s been used with consent. Stepwise makes customer numbers trustworthy again and thereby stems the leakage of personal information.

Stepwise benefits include:

• identifiers cannot be cloned, counterfeited, or illicitly copied from one smartcard to another
• transactions originating from a Stepwise smartcard are sealed with their respective identifiers, contain the bare minimum personal information, and cannot be cross-linked with each other
• every transaction bears a tamper-proof pedigree, proving it originated from an authentic smartcard carrying a bona fide identifier, used with the consent of the cardholder.