The ISO 7816 Smart Card Standard

The standardization of smart card systems is an ongoing process. One of the standards most referred to is the ISO-7816 standard. ISO stands for International Standards Organization and the standard has been established to describe "Identification Cards - Integrated Circuit Cards with Contacts". It includes multiple parts the first 5 of which are listed in the following table.

ISO7816 document Description
ISO 7816-1 Physical characteristics
ISO 7816-2 Dimensions and location of the contacts
ISO 7816-3 Electronic signals and transmission protocols
ISO 7816-4 Industry commands for interchange
ISO 7816-5 Number system and registration procedure for application identifiers
ISO 7816-6 Interindustry data elements