If you're new to NFC technology, NFC stands for near field communication which is the technology inside credit cards and tap-and-go services like Apple Pay that allows you to use them for contactless payments. NFC is a popular communication technology because it's cheaper to integrate (when compared to GPS and Bluetooth) and it's also smartphone compatible. This makes NFC technology an ideal candidate for enabling instant interactions of Internet Of Things such as Raspberry Pi projects.

NFC works similar to Bluetooth as it transfers data. The difference though is that instead of using wireless pairing connectivity to connect devices, NFC communication uses chips that run on very low amounts of power; hence making NFC chips much more power efficient than wireless connections. Many wireless devices today even have built-in NFC technology, which really makes these NFC-enabled devices much faster to connect via Bluetooth than pairing devices manually.

A new NFC tool solution developed by Kasper & Oswald, called ChameleonMini, will be launching to market this summer of 2016. The ChameleonMini is a powerful card emulator and cloning tool about the size of a credit card, which allows you to emulate and clone contactless smart cards (up to eight personal cards) in one device, read RFID tags and sniff RF data.

The ChameleonMini is essentially a RFID reader, NFC emulator, sniffer and data logger tool all in one handy solution. You can create perfect clones of ISO 14443, NFC, and ISO 15693 cards, as well as clones of other types of RFID transponders operating at 13.56 MHz. The ChameleonMini runs on an Atmel ATXMega128A4U microcontroller, which uses DES and AES encryption for very fast reading and cloning.

Another great feature of the ChameleonMini NFC card emulator and clone is that the firmware is being developed on an existing ChameleonMini github project, which means design files and source code are open-source. The tool also fully supports emulation of Mifare Classic 1k and 4k cards as well as Mifare Ultralight cards. Also, since the ChameleonMini is rechargeable you can take it around with you without having to connect it to a desktop computer or laptop.