e-Cash: CAFE vs. Mondex

[Matthias Schunter]

Dear Mr. Klur,


I'm member of the CAFE consortium but I can not answer your question.
As far as we know, the details of the Mondex protocols are still 
confidential (or only available under a non-disclosure license). 

However, I can give you some details about CAFE. 

The CAFE system is a cheque based system. This means that the customer receives an electronic chequebook, where each cheque is (blindly) signed by the bank.
During each payment the customer has to use one of these signed cheques.

Some of its properties are:
 secure
   Breaking the card results in a limited gain, since soon the customer will
   run out of cheques (Mondex' security is quite likely only based on 
   tamper-resistance).
 open
   Due to the open public-key architecture used, the system is open, e.g., it 
   supports multiple-issuer, multiple-currencies.
   One part of this openness is the public availability of the specifications.
 practical
   It provides full loss- and fault-tolerance (i.e. if you loose your wallet 
   you're able to recover your electronic money) and supports fast
   micropayments (e.g., for phone ticks).
 privacy-protecting
   The privacy of the user is protected.

We will soon publish our full protocol and architecture specifications.
A short 50-page summary is already available (PostScript). 
Additional information may be found at
 http://www.informatik.uni-hildesheim.de/~sirene/projects/cafe/index.html

Please ontact me, if you are interested in this abstract or if you have additional questions.


Regards,

 M. Schunter


--- Forwarded mail from "David Klur" <dklur at dttus.com>

Date: Mon, 11 Dec 95 12:13:48 CST
From: "David Klur" <dklur at dttus.com>
To: cypherpunks at toad.com, WWW-BUYINFO at allegra.att.com
     
     Is the Cafe e-cash system different than Mondex? If so, how?
     Also, does anyone know when the Mondex trial will start in Delaware?

---End of forwarded mail from "David Klur" <dklur at dttus.com>

% Matthias <Schunter at acm.org> Uni Hildesheim +49(5121)883-788 fax-732