Introduction

I’ve been interested in RFID hacking for a really long time. The "gold standard" has been the proxmark series of tools. Unfortunately, these are quite expensive, especially for a hobbyist. However, thanks to the internet and the usual sources, there are pre-assembled versions available for under $100.

In this post, I’ll share a quick tutorial on how to clone an access control card to a rewriteable card.

The Hardware

The hardware I’m using was purchased from Amazon for $67. I don’t know what firmware was loaded on it, because it didn’t seem to work initially. The first thing I did was clone the RFID Research Group repository (sometimes known as the iceman repository). This contains both the proxmark software and the firmware for the device. The firmware is loaded by running ./pm3-flash-all in the repository after building. One issue is that the USB port on the long side of the device does not seem to work. I didn’t take any notes nor do I remember the exact process I followed, but I think it was pretty straight forward once it was actually speaking with my computer. I’m assuming that is for powering the device with something that can deliver more current than a standard USB port.