LaserCard Corporation Receives Order Resident ID Program
Same Basic Characteristics as the Canada Permanent Resident Card

LaserCard Corporation,  announced the receipt of a purchase order valued at more than us$500,000 for highly secure optical memory-based Permanent Resident Cards to be issued by Costa Rica to its legal non-citizen residents.

The card, which features custom artwork and security features, follows the layout of the U.S. Green Card and Border Crossing Card (BCC) and is designed to be interoperable with the optical memory-based border inspections systems implemented by the U.S. and Canadian governments. LaserCard has sold more than 25 million Green Cards and BCCs since 1997.

After an intensive investigation by the Costa Rica authorities, the LaserCard® was selected as the immigration ID card for the program. As the first Latin American country to implement an electronic ID card program, Costa Rica is on the forefront of continuing technological advancements in secure identification.

"We are pleased to announce our fourth national government instituting an ID program in the Americas, and the first in the proposed Central American Free Trade Agreement region," said Richard Haddock, CEO of LaserCard Corporation. "The fundamental requirement for security led the Costa Rican government to select optical memory, which has no known instance of compromise, making it unique among advanced card technologies."

According to local press reports the card will replace various documents that identify different types of immigration status granted by the country. The card will have a five-year validity with annual renewals.

Shipments are expected to be completed by December 2005.