8 pin Connector at the card.
The AFNOR smart card format predates the full ISO/IEC 7816 series and was used in early French memory cards such as the Télécarte public telephone card, first deployed in 1983. Unlike the later ISO 7816 scheme, pins are numbered 1–8 in a counterclockwise arrangement and the signal names differ — notably, the R/W control line replaces the ISO RST signal, and a dedicated FUSE contact provides a hardware security feature. The programming voltage VPP ran at +21 V on these EPROM-based cards, reflecting the technology of the era before cards generated their own internal voltages. France was the earliest mass adopter of contact smart cards, and the AFNOR field position — placing the contact block in the upper-left area of the card face — was later incorporated as a transitional reference in early editions of ISO/IEC 7816-2.
| Pin | Name | Description |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | VCC | +5 VDC |
| 2 | R/W | Read/Write |
| 3 | CLOCK | Clock |
| 4 | RESET | Reset |
| 5 | GND | Ground |
| 6 | VPP | +21 VDC |
| 7 | I/O | In/Out |
| 8 | FUSE | Fuse |
Signals
- VCC — supply voltage input, +5 V DC.
- R/W — read/write control line; governs access direction to card memory.
- CLOCK — external clock input synchronising card operations.
- RESET — resets the card logic.
- GND — ground reference.
- VPP — programming voltage input at +21 V DC, required to write to the EPROM memory cells on early French cards.
- I/O — bidirectional serial data line.
- FUSE — security fuse contact used on early French memory cards to permanently disable write access after personalisation.
Notes
The physical contact field position defined by AFNOR places the 8-contact block in the upper-left area of the card face, distinct from the ISO/IEC 7816-2 position which locates the field in the lower-right area. Pin numbering runs counterclockwise (1 bottom-right to 8 top-right), in contrast to the ISO C1–C8 row-major scheme. The +21 V VPP supply reflects the EPROM programming requirements of 1980s card technology; later ISO-compliant cards generate programming voltage internally and no longer require an external high-voltage supply on that contact.