Unlock Your Android Phone With Open Source Wearable NFC

coop0030 (263345) writes "Becky Stern at Adafruit has created a guide on how to create an open source NFC ring or other wearable to mod and unlock your Android phone. From the tutorial: 'Unlock your phone by just picking it up! No more pesky password or gesture PIN, just scan an NFC tag! This guide covers creating an NFC ring, putting an NFC tag in your nail polish, modding your Android installation to read tags from the lockscreen, and creating an automation toolchain to unlock the phone when the desired tag is scanned.' There is also a video that demonstrates how it works."

NFC Rings

[mythosaz]

You can grab NRC tag rings fairly cheaply at most of the Hong Kong importers.

One of many examples:
http://www.dx.com/p/smart-nfc-... [dx.com]

Re:Do not want

[Anonymous Coward]

I don't know about anyone else, but when I pick up my phone, I want it to work. Every time. This kind of interlock just adds another point of failure. Suppose a bunch of thugs (you know who I mean) are in my house, and I need to call the police?

In Europe you can call emergency services from a locked phone. Not sure if that feature is crippled at your place.

Getting an NFC tag to play with

[Fencepost]

If you don't happen to have any NFC tags around, Shell gas stations with their Circle K convenience stores are using them as their new "loyalty" tags. You won't be able to write to them, but you can certainly read the ID out of one.

It's easier than you might think.

[Stealth Dave]

I've been doing this on my Galaxy S3 for over 9 months now using an NFC tag glued to my watch band. All you need is a rooted phone running Android 4.0.3 and above and a willingness to install an XPosed plugin or two. This link has all the details:

http://forum.xda-developers.com/xposed/modules/mod-nfc-unlocking-based-t2478163

TL;DR Steps:

• ROOT YOUR PHONE (You'll have to Google this one yourself)
• Install XPosed Framework [xposed.info]
• Install NFC Lock Screen Off Enabler [xposed.info] module (you can find it in the Modules section of the XPosed Installer app)
• Turn on NFC in lockscreen or screen off modes as desired
• Register your NFC Tags to unlock your phone

Much easier (and safer, IMO) than installing a modified system apk, and this method can also survive system upgrades provided that you maintain root. It will launch whatever action is set for that NFC tag (link, text, app, whatever), but you can use another XPosed module [xda-developers.com] to supress the "Empty Tag" message on empty tags, if you so desire.

The Adafruit link from TFA has some interesting ideas on how to squeeze your NFC tag into some interesting places, and you can also buy some pretty small NFC tags on your own. I bought 20 Midas nTag NFC tags on Amazon for $13 with Prime shipping, and they measure 19mm x 12mm. You can shave another 2mm off of either dimension if you're very careful with the trimming. That was more than small enough to fit on the clasp of my watch, or on the back of a plastic watch band.

Re:Do not want

[Anonymous Coward]

It's a comment on Gun Locks. Ahaha, most people are stupid.

Re:Do not want

[AvitarX]

I actually thought the grandparent was satire about gun safety (similar system for a smart gun caused death threats recently).

You may or may not think it's funny, but I highly suspect the mods knew what was going on and thought it was funny, the poster I think clearly does not think like was posted.

I'm not particularly disturbed by the mod, anymore than Jonathan Swift proclaiming we need to eat the poor.