Hub of Activity
Through consistent outreach, the Center now has partnerships with other industry groups, manufacturers and system service providers. Member manufacturers are using the Center to conduct their own internal training programs and national sales events; system integrators are increasingly using the Center to brief their federal customers on their capabilities (and boast of their CSEIP certified staff) as well as demonstrate their equipment displayed in the Center. The American Society for Industrial Security (ASIS) now credits the recertification of their Certified Protection Professional (CPP) and the Physical Security Professional (PSP) with 17 certification units when the recertification applicant shows a valid CSEIP certification.

Buyers Guide Assists with Requests
The Center worked with GSA’s staff in Fort Worth to create a “Buyers Guide for GSA APL EPACS Systems,” for federal contracting/procurement officers when writing Requests for Information (RFI), Requests for Quote (RFQ) and Requests for Purchase (RFP). The PACS Buyers Guide is written in a generic brand agnostic template format and is also used by industry service providers when writing proposals responding to the RFIs, RFQs and RFPs. The Buyers Guide ensures that only compliant equipment is proposed and engineered by staff with proven relevant competencies. The Buyers Guide is posted on both a federal-only website (Acquisition Gateway) and the public website GSA.gov; if interested, download a free PDF of the guide.

Certification Success
The CSEIP program was very successful this year, with 60 individuals receiving their certification. The CSCIP programs saw professionals from companies such as Capital One, Discover, HP Enterprise, UL and XTec became certified in one of the three CSCIP designations (CSCIP, CSCIP/G and CSCIP/P). In further expansion, individuals from England, India, Malaysia and Sri Lanka have received training and/or requested certification exams. The recent CSEIP update, "Logical Access Systems (LACS) Meet Physical Access Systems (PACS)," has been well received among those who completed this additional CSEIP training module. The recent update of OMB Circular A-130 further emphasizes the point that PACS are indeed part of the federal IT infrastructure. The implications in this are wide-ranging, and will have impact across all federal agencies.

Next year, the Center will continue the effort of expanding market presence and building awareness of the certification programs. Working closely with the Smart Card Alliance Industry Councils to maintain a leading edge role in the education programs for new market opportunities will ensure a busy year ahead. Thank you to all who are part of our training initiatives.

CSCIP
If you are planning on taking the any of our training sessions, make sure to save the date and set up a reminder in your calendar to register. If your company is interested in hosting a corporate exam, let us know. The next training class for CSCIP will be on the road in Texas, and not at the National Center for Advanced Payments and Identity Security.

• CSCIP Training and Exam, March 6, 2017 (training) and March 7 (exam), Corporate Identification Systems Group, San Antonio, TX

CSCIP/Government
These training sessions will be held at the National Center for Advanced Payments and Identity Security located in Crystal City, just outside of Washington, D.C. at 2900 Crystal Drive, Arlington, Virginia.

• CSCIP/G Training and Exam, February 14, 2017 (training), February 15 (exam)
• CSCIP/G Training and Exam, October 17, 2017 (training) and October 18 (exam), National Center for Advanced Payments and Identity Security

• CSCIP/P Training and Exam March 27, 2017 (training) and March 28 (exam), Renaissance Orlando at Sea World, Orlando, FL (during SCA Payments Summit Conference)
• CSCIP/P Training and Exam, Sept. 5, 2017 (training) and Sept. 6 (exam), National Center for Advanced Payments and Identity Security

• Download the CSCIP Certification Application - Fillable Word Form, PDF
• Download the CSCIP, CSCIP/G and/or CSCIP/P Exam Registration and Documentation Order Form - Fillable Word Form, PDF

• CSEIP Training and Exam, Jan. 31–Feb. 2, 2017
• CSEIP Training and Exam, March 14-16, 2017
• CSEIP Training and Exam, April 11-13, 2017

• Download the CSEIP application – Fillable Word Form, PDF

• The Smart Card Alliance Payments Council hosted two webinars on contactless EMV payments benefits, one focused on merchants and one focused on issuers
• The Smart Card Alliance Payments Council held a well-attended webinar on EMV tokenization. The webinar described EMV tokenization, its use in mobile payments, implementation of a tokenization system, and security considerations
• The U.S. Payments Forum hosted a successful webinar on EMV Chargeback Best Practices. The webinar discussed the appropriate treatment and mitigation of both counterfeit and lost/stolen chip liability shift chargebacks occurring after the liability shift dates for contact chip cards used in attended transactions. The webinar recording is available on the EMV Connection web site
• The Forum published a new white paper, Optimizing Transaction Time at the Point of Sale, to describe three categories of approaches to help speed transactions and discuss their potential impacts for each stakeholder group in the U.S. payments ecosystem: “Faster EMV” solutions (i.e., Quick Chip and M/Chip Fast), contactless/Near Field Communication (NFC) transactions, and other EMV checkout optimization practices
• The Forum updated its white paper, EMV Implementation Guidance: Fallback Transactions, to provide more information on critical values in the fallback compliance process