SpringCard contactless PC/SC couplers (NFC/RFID HF) can be used to read contactless passes carried by NFC smartphones.
In particular, the Prox’N’Roll HSP PC/SC and the PUCK configured as PC/SC have been certified :
5 years ago, SpringCard introduced SCardSniffer, a tool that spies the exchanges between Windows applications and the PC/SC subsystem. SCardSniffer works by introducing a hook over winscard.dll.
Although this method is still perfectly working in most cases, it comes with some technical complexity (1. the sniffer and the sniffed application must both run on the same subsystem, either Win32 or Win64, hence 2 versions of the sniffer and 2. the injection of the hook is likely to be disabled on security-enforced computers and 3. it may also triggers some antivirus/malware detection tools, which leads to an unnecessary stress).
SCardSniffer2 is a new tool that offers basically the same function, but with a much simpler architecture.
SCardSniffer2 installs a new virtual smart card reader and acts as a relay between this virtual reader and the real reader, where the real card is.
The application to be spied must be reconfigured to connect to the virtual reader (instead of the real reader); SCardSniffer2 is then able to record all the APDUs exhanged between the application and the card.
RFIDDiscover (formerly MifareDiscover) is a GUI software provided by NXP to help the developers explore the features of their contactless cards (Mifare, Desfire, NTAG and ICode) and learn how-to use them from a real application.
This software is available to customers under NDA with NXP, through the DocStore document delivery platform (ref. SW1866).
This article shows how-to get started with this RFIDDiscover, in the aim of using it together with SpringCard devices. This is the preferred method to learn how those cards work, before starting the development of any software that would use them for data storage and/or secure transactions.
Card Test Framework is a GUI software provided by NXP to help the developers explore the features of their contactless cards (Mifare, Desfire, NTAG and ICode) and learn how-to use them from a real application.
This software is available to customers under NDA (non-disclosure agreement) with NXP, through the DocStore document delivery platform (ref. SW5434).
This article shows how-to get started with this Card Test Framework, in the aim of using it together with SpringCard devices.
NXP TapLinx SDK (formerly Mifare SDK) is an high-level sofware library provided by NXP to work with their Mifare, Desfire, NTAG and ICode products.
Written in Java, the TapLinx library has been initially developed for Android, running over Android’s NfcAdapter object to communicate with the contactless cards or NFC tags through the tablet’s or smartphone’s integrated NFC interface.
Recently, the library has been ported to the standard JDK, making it usable in any Java desktop applications thanks to the JRE available on Windows, macOs, Linux, and more. In desktop applications, the TapLinx library relies on the system’s PC/SC stack (javax.smartcardio API in Java) to access the contactless cards or NFC tags through a standard-compliant PC/SC coupler.
This makes TapLinx an interesting solution for developers of desktop applications that have to process NXP cards or tags. This article shows how-to get started with this SDK, in the aim of using it together with SpringCard devices.
SpringCard Companion is the new all-in-one solution to manage, configure and update the latest generation of SpringCard “SpringCore” devices (Puck, SpringPark, etc). SpringCard Companion is an hybrid application that combines a clean, efficient and always up-to-date web front-end with a tiny local software, the Companion Service, that is the gateway between the cloud and the devices connected to your computer or local network.
As such, the Companion Service is also the base component to connect any application built for the web with the ‘physical world’ of PC/SC couplers and Smart Readers, using only simple WebSocket and REST API calls.
Before you start using SpringCard Companion Web application (available at companion.springcard.com) you should install the Companion Service on a Windows computer.