NFC as smartcard emulator

[WarrenBoy]

Hi all,

I am on Android 4.3. Is it possible or are their any apps to scan a smartcard with NFC, and save the data so that the phone can be used as a smartcard? Thanks for the help in advance!!! The smartcards I am talking about are building access smartcards.

 

[garublador]

It may be technically possible, but I doubt you'll find any apps that do it. That seems like a pretty big security hole if you can just copy building entrance cards like that. It sort of defeats the purpose of having them.

 

[Rukbat]

The "smartcards" you're talking about are RFID devices. They're radios that receive a signal from the reader, use that signal to produce enough power to transmit a signal and transmit a coded signal. The computer running the system decides whether that code should unlock that door (and unlocks it if it should).

A phone can't do that simply because it can't transmit the radio signal that an RFID transmits (or receive the request to transmit that the RFID receives). And what would you transmit to make sure that every phone had a unique code? Its MEID?

 

[garublador]

The "smartcards" you're talking about are RFID devices. They're radios that receive a signal from the reader, use that signal to produce enough power to transmit a signal and transmit a coded signal. The computer running the system decides whether that code should unlock that door (and unlocks it if it should).

A phone can't do that simply because it can't transmit the radio signal that an RFID transmits (or receive the request to transmit that the RFID receives). And what would you transmit to make sure that every phone had a unique code? Its MEID?

RFID is just a form of NFC. I'm pretty sure they operate on the same frequency. Phones can read and write over NFC assuming the format is correct (my assumption is that most key cards are NTAG203, but I could be wrong), so it doesn't seem like there's a hardware issue stopping it from working. There may be some other security feature built into the hardware in our phones that prevents it from working (at least I hope there is), but I don't think i't because a phone couldn't possibly communicate with a RFID reader.