Using Wallet.app to open doors with NFC reader

App & System Services Hardware iPhone Wallet Core NFC Apple Pay

Created Jan ’21

Replies 36

Boosts 12

Views 80k

Participants 44

G'day.

At my office the doors are locked with an NFC reader. We carry around a little NFC tag on our key chains which will read out a number and this then will open the door if the number matches a number in the database.

I am tired of carrying around the tag, people keep loosing it, forgetting it and it would be nice to open the door using a Phone - which we tend to always have on us.

So I used a credit card which is NFC enabled to readout the NFC information, added this number to the database and can now open doors using my credit card. This is pretty cool. If I forget my keys (most likely they will be on the desk but silly me left the desk without them), I may have my wallet with me.

Then I tried Wallet.app on my iPhone and select the same credit card. However the door doesn't open. When looking in the door software I noticed that the tags will always transmit the same number. So does my credit card. However Wallet.app will read out 4 readings (or maybe just one very long one) and they are always different. So I can not make them match with the door database.

Any ideas how to make this work? Can I give somehow wallet.app an NFC number which I can then add to my door database? Or how come the credit card and the very same one in wallet.app don't match?

Thanks for your help! Would be neat if I could make this work out. This will make a lot of people happy at my office!

Cheers!

Boost

airmail OP

Jan ’24

While I want Apple to support this natively, this may be possible using a small NFC tag under your phone's case or attached to the back. Something like this: https://taptag.shop/products/tap-tag-hyperslim. (The price is ridiculous, but I guess they know they have a niche thing that people want.) It essentially doesn't use the iPhone's NFC chip. I don't have one of these (yet) and am not sure if this would affect Qi charging or have any other ill effect.

airmail OP

Jan ’24

Would something like an NFC tag affixed onto or under your phone case be a good workaround here? Something like this: https://taptag.shop/products/tap-tag-hyperslim.

donaldinos OP

Feb ’24

I think this might be the solution to your problem https://meintechblog.de/2024/01/30/apple-home-key-diy/

Bernie-Brooklyn OP

Feb ’24

Through our work at getkisi.com, have a bit of experience with this topic:

We manufacture NFC card / mobile readers and also allow to enroll 3rd party NFC cards including credit cards: https://docs.kisi.io/references/credentials/physical_credentials/third_party_nfc_credentials?_highlight=nfc
When using credit card wallets such as Apple Wallet or crypto related wallets like you suggest, those will encrypt the credit card number and require a security decoding at the receiving end - in this case the NFC wall reader.

The only way to use NFC based cards on wallets on Apple devices is via Apple Wallet as outlined here: https://www.getkisi.com/guides/apple-wallet-access

rlhamil OP

Jun ’24

How about NFC readable store discount cards? A bit of a privacy issue maybe, but no money really changes hands with those, so no harm if they're static.

micahamj OP

Jun ’24

Interesting github on subject using home app https://github.com/kormax/apple-home-key-reader