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PRODA-14 RESTRICTED CONTRACTS
Bringing Technology to Post Offices and Benefit Payments
ITT HURDLE CLEARANCE CERTIFICATE
Service Provider: Pathway Hurdle: (a) Service Requirements
Cleared: Yes Yo {delete as req'd}
Certification
I confirm to the Evaluation Board that the service provider's proposal has performed against
the above hurdle (as defined in paper PWKP4-8, Issue 2.0) as described in this document
Authorised by Date:
- Tony Johnson, 2v27/80
Tony Johnson
Deputy Programme Director
SS
1. SUMMARY OF SUB-HURDLES 4
BL The clearance status of each of the Service Requirement sub-hurdles is shown in the
table below, together with any issues for consideration. Issues may be relevant to
more than one sub-hurdle. For ease of documentation, the main sub-hurdle impacted
is annotated. Supporting text on the issues against the identified sub-hurdles is
documented in the following section
Sub-Hurdle Clearance Status I Issues
i, Customer acceptability Cleared No major issues I
i. Staff/agent acceptability Cleared No major issues
iii, Fraud-free method of Cleared Card technology and
payment authentication
Fraud & risk management
Stops
iv. Robustness, security, Cleared Riposte partly unproven
reliability and flexibility
v. Accounting reconciliation [Cleared No major issues
vi. Emergency payments Cleared No major issues
vii. One-off payments Cleared No major issues
viii.POCL product automation I Cleared Bespoke development
ix, Automation of all post Cleared No major issues
offices
x. Management and technical I Cleared General concerns
capability I
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2.
2.1.
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Card technology and authentication uf
SPECIFIC ISSUES
Fraud-free method of payment
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The issue relates to an outstanding risk on Pathway (PWY078) which states:
“The proposed card authentication_method CAM) is insecure and places an
unrealistic reliance on the vigilance of post office counter clerks. Pathway’s proposed
fraud and risk management does not mitigate the risk of aweak CAM. The proposed
CAM does not allow for the identification of a counterfeit card. Potential attributable
costs in this area are not restricted purely to financial loss through fraud. Other areas
of impact are:
—————_
(a) additional administration costs caused by card compromise
(b) loss of confidence in the BPS
(c) political damage in the event of genuine customers being denied benefit, or
being subject to allegations of transaction repudiation
(d) increased exposure to widespread transaction repudiation due to publicity of
card compromise”
At this point Pathway have been unable to mitigate the risk as they would no
prefer to introduce a protected memory integrated circuit (IC) card from Day One
As there is insufficient time available between now and issue of ITT for Pathway t
provide a detailed revised solution (because the change impacts many areas) and for
the Programme to evaluate it, Pathway have decided to remain with their current card
and bring in the IC card through Change Control. a
Detailed documentation on this issue is available.
Fraud & risk management
The issue relates to two outstanding risks - fraud and risk management during roll-
out (PWY079) and steady state (PWY082). Pathway’s documented approach has
been deemed short of strong countermeasures and is based on being reactive to an
analysis of information from the MIS.
Stops
This issue again relates to an outstanding risk (PWY076). This states that:
“If the communications link to a post office has failed, the STOP messages will not
be actioned on home office payments made at that post office”
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2.2,
2.3.
2.4.
Pathway proposes that the Help Desk telephones STOPs to post offices where the
data lines are not working. However, there remains a problem where the voice and
data lines are down simultaneously
Robustness, security, reliability and flexibility
Riposte is the office middleware in the Pathway solution. The ‘unproven’ aspects of
Riposte relate to two areas:
(a) Riposte 32 is a new product, currently being developed by Escher for An Post
in Ireland and BA/POCL. The previous version, Riposte 2, is in live use in An
Post, and also in POCL ALPS, although the architectures are slightly different.
There has been considerable ‘internal’ changes between Riposte 2 and 32.
(b) Issues have been raised on “sealability’, as Riposte has only been seen working
in a much smaller environment to BA/POCL. These have been addressed
through modelling and an informal demonstration of the transaction rates that
can be supported. As part of the development for Riposte 32, Escher are
making a number of enhancements to improve performance to ensure it is
suitable for the BA/POCL scale.
POCL product automation
Bespoke development
The Pathway counter solution is not based on any existing package but is a bespoke
development, re-using some of the applicable elements of the An Post system. A
considerable amount of development is required.
Management and technical capability
General concerns
A concem remains that Pathway have failed to demonstrate effective leadership and
management during the Demonstrator phase which raises fears on their ability to
deliver a product on-time and to quality.
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