Your Smartcard is Dumb A Brief History of Hacking Access Control Systems
Chad Shortman
DEF CON 32 Creator Stage · Day 1 · Creator Stage
In his DEF CON 32 talk, "Your Smartcard is Dumb: A Brief History of Hacking Access Control Systems," Chad Shortman takes the audience on a journey through decades of vulnerabilities in physical access control. Shortman, a seasoned hacker with a background in CTFs and binary exploitation, expresses a profound fascination with exploits that bridge the digital and physical worlds, stating that "seeing a pound sign pop up on your screen versus seeing a door unlock is a very different adrenaline hit." This talk aims to demystify how building access systems operate and expose their inherent weaknesses, from rudimentary mechanical bypasses to sophisticated digital cloning techniques.