With the growing concern for the security of documents being transmited through network-connected multifunctional products (MFPs) and the need to comply with recent government laws and regulations about information security, Konica Minolta is among the first in the industry to achieve Evaluation Assurance Level (EAL) 3 and ISO 15408 (Common Criteria Certification or CC) for its line of bizhub™ and bizhub PRO™ color and monochrome MFPs. This certification includes CC certification for the bizhub C6500, the first Konica Minolta light production color MFP to be ISO 15408 certified. The ISO 15408 is the only official security-based certification standard for digital office products.

    Kevin Kern, vice president, product planning and development, Konica Minolta Business Solutions U.S.A., Inc., stated: "Public awareness of the importance of data security in the widespread use of MFPs has been raised by recent news warning of identity theft risks associated with hard drives in digital copiers. Konica Minolta MFPs have achieved CC certification for over three years, which assures our customers that any Konica
Minolta MFP in our current lineup can be used in environments that demand strict data security. Customers have the peace of mind of knowing that with Konica Minolta, they have the most secure MFPs on the market today."

    The International Common Criteria for Information Technology Security Evaluation settles an internationally agreed upon language for specifying security functionality, as well as an evaluation methodology to assess the strength of security implementations embedded in various types of technology available on the network. The Common Criteria initiative has reached an international standard known as ISO 15408. In the United States it is managed by the National Information Assurance Partnership (NIAP), which is run by the National Security Agency and the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST).

    The Hard Drive Overwrite security function developed by Konica Minolta's erases information stored on the device's HDD or memory by overwriting it with a series of characters and comes standard on the company's bizhub OP and workgroup product line. Hard Drive Overwrite is performed immediately upon completion of all copy, print, scan and fax jobs. The company offers an extra level of security with a hard drive encryption kit using 128-bit Advanced Encryption Standard (AES). Even more, the bizhub HDD can be locked using a passcode of 20 alphanumeric characters and the information is protected, even if the drive is removed from the machine.

Related documentation can be found here: www.commoncriteriaportal.org/public/consumer/index.php