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<h1>My weird piece of EDC</h1>
<h4>Reasons why I always carry NFC cards with me</h4>
<hr>
<p><em>2019-08-10 16:57:00 -0400</em></p>
<br>
<p>Im back with a quick little post about something I cary with me everywhere I go, EDC (Every-Day Carry) if you will.</p>
<h2 id="how-this-started">How this started</h2>
<p>Earlier this year, my friend <a href="https://github.com/retrax24" class="user-mention">@retrax24</a> showed me a piece of “fake ID” he was given as a joke. After some experimentation, he noticed that, upon tapping it to his phone, he would get an error message about an un-formatted card.</p>
<p>After hearing of this, I opened up <a href="https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.wakdev.nfctools.pro">NFC Tools</a> on my phone and started playing. We had quite some fun with <a href="#shenanigans">various settings and data</a>, and I decided that I wanted a card too. I send a message to someone that I knew worked with these, and got myself 4 to play with.</p>
<h2 id="shenanigans">Shenanigans</h2>
<p>Upon figuring out how to write to <a href="https://github.com/retrax24" class="user-mention">@retrax24</a>’s card, we started out simple. We sent bits of text to eachother, and I eventually sent him a copy of my contact information, and bitcoin address. Then, came the real fun..</p>
<p>By setting the data type to <code class="highlighter-rouge">external link</code>, and the content to <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dQw4w9WgXcQ">this totally not suspicious URL</a>, we now had the perfect tool for derailing a lesson. An automatic <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rickrolling">Rick Roll</a> card. Upon tapping this card to a phone, the youtube app would auto-play <em>Rick Astley’s Never Gonna Give You Up</em>. After this discovery, people started asking to buy pre-configured cards from me <img class="emoji" title=":laughing:" alt=":laughing:" src="https://github.githubassets.com/images/icons/emoji/unicode/1f606.png" height="20" width="20">.</p>
<p>After this came even more fun ideas:</p>
<ul>
<li>Enabling flashlights</li>
<li>Rebooting phones</li>
<li>Calling phone numbers</li>
<li>Sending texts</li>
<li>Filling phones with fake contacts</li>
</ul>
<h2 id="practical-use">Practical use</h2>
<p>I don’t actually carry my cards around for messing with people but instead, use them for things like:</p>
<ul>
<li>Cloning hotel access cards (being in a room of 4 with only 2 cards)</li>
<li>Creating login cards for school printers (so I don’t have to log in manually)</li>
<li>Sharing small amounts of data and links between phones</li>
<li>Giving my contact info to people</li>
</ul>
<p>Thanks to the NFC Tools app, pretty much everything is 3 taps and a swipe away. I strongly recommend picking up some cards for yourself if wou work with a large number of NFC-compatible systems.</p>
<h2 id="an">A/N</h2>
<p>Occasionally, I either have nothing in the works, or am working on some very boring and technical projects, so I look to post some fun content like this. Currently the latter of the options is true, and I wanted a quick break from writing networking code.</p>
<p>Let me know what you think of this type of content!</p>
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This site was last updated at: 2019-08-13 15:02:17 -0400
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