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Identifying RF Identification Cards from Measurements of Resonance and Carrier Harmonics
Published
Author(s)
Henry Romero, Kate Remley, Dylan Williams, Chih-Ming Wang, Timothy X. Brown
Abstract
We show that careful measurements of the unloaded resonant frequency and quality factor of radio frequency identification proximity cards allow identification of different card models and, for the set of cards we studied, identification with minimal error of individual cards of the same model. Furthermore, we show that card identification performance is improved by considering an electromagnetic signature that combines measurements of the energy at carrier harmonics during a reader-card transaction together with unloaded resonant frequency and quality factor measurements.
Citation
IEEE Transactions on Microwave Theory and Techniques
Romero, H.
, Remley, K.
, Williams, D.
, Wang, C.
and Brown, T.
(2010),
Identifying RF Identification Cards from Measurements of Resonance and Carrier Harmonics, IEEE Transactions on Microwave Theory and Techniques, [online], https://tsapps.nist.gov/publication/get_pdf.cfm?pub_id=904644
(Accessed October 27, 2025)