Do macbook pros have built in NFC readers, given they all have applepay?

[humpbacktwale]

I noticed the nfcd process, under the _applepay user was sending and receiving a few kb's of data, yet somehow the number of packets sent and received were in the hundreds, which shouldn't really be the case given the amount of data is so low. Moreover, it has no open files or ports, and I don't use applepay, and haven't added any cards to it, so I thought maybe it was picking up some nfc device. But I can't find anything indicating macbook pro's even have nfc chips built in. This then begs the question why the process even ne I am currently on a macbook pro 2018 13 inch.

 

[BigBlur]

Apple Pay is basically just an umbrella term for Apple's payment method. It doesn't always mean contactless payment via NFC. There may be an NFC chip, but that still doesn't mean you can do NFC/contactless stuff.

This article says there is a NFC controller in the Touch Bar. My guess it's only used for secure storage, like on iPads.

Some iPads also have a NFC chip, but no antenna to do contactless stuff. (https://pocketnow.com/ipad-nfc-chip)

So why is there an NFC chip at all, if it can’t be used for NFC? Two words: secure element. The NFC chip acts as secure storage of payment-related details, and even if you’re not using them for contactless payments in retail stores, Apple Pay can still draw upon that secure data for processing payments sent online. That’s reportedly why the NFC chips are present in these devices, even if their full capabilities are going unused.

 

[macOS Lynx]

I noticed the nfcd process, under the _applepay user was sending and receiving a few kb's of data, yet somehow the number of packets sent and received were in the hundreds, which shouldn't really be the case given the amount of data is so low. Moreover, it has no open files or ports, and I don't use applepay, and haven't added any cards to it, so I thought maybe it was picking up some nfc device. But I can't find anything indicating macbook pro's even have nfc chips built in. This then begs the question why the process even ne I am currently on a macbook pro 2018 13 inch.

Even if the MacBooks had NFC chips built in (older ones I know do as the Secure Enclave was tied to the NFC controller, but newer T2 Macs I believe do not have that NFC controller), they don't have NFC antennas, so there's literally no way for it to communicate via NFC.

 

[bogdanw]

I have Monterey only in a virtual machine and I don’t see it running, but you can try to see what’s starting it with
sudo launchctl blame user/260/com.apple.nfcd
stop the process with
sudo launchctl bootout user/260/com.apple.nfcd
and disable it with
sudo launchctl disable user/260/com.apple.nfcd

 

[humpbacktwale]

Apple Pay is basically just an umbrella term for Apple's payment method. It doesn't always mean contactless payment via NFC. There may be an NFC chip, but that still doesn't mean you can do NFC/contactless stuff.

This article says there is a NFC controller in the Touch Bar. My guess it's only used for secure storage, like on iPads.

Some iPads also have a NFC chip, but no antenna to do contactless stuff. (https://pocketnow.com/ipad-nfc-chip)

Ah ok, so chip and antenna would be separate.

 

[humpbacktwale]

I have Monterey only in a virtual machine and I don’t see it running, but you can try to see what’s starting it with
sudo launchctl blame user/260/com.apple.nfcd
stop the process with
sudo launchctl bootout user/260/com.apple.nfcd
and disable it with
sudo launchctl disable user/260/com.apple.nfcd

using id in the terminal doesn't seem to list 260 as a valid uid

 

[bogdanw]

id -u _applepay

 

[humpbacktwale]

Ok so that is 260 but it says:

Could not find service "com.apple.nfcd" in domain for uid: 260

Going into activity monitor and sampling it doesn't even give com.apple.nfcd, just nfcd, and it can't find it in domain 260 either..

 

[bogdanw]

Processes do not have the name of the launch agent/daemon that launches them, and vice versa.
If you look inside /System/Library/LaunchDaemons/com.apple.nfcd.plist you will find that the process launched by that daemon is /usr/libexec/nfcd
I was able to find the correct syntax by using kickstart, this command restarts the nfcd process (PID changes)

sudo launchctl kickstart -k system/com.apple.nfcd
So, this command should disable it after a restart

sudo launchctl disable system/com.apple.nfcd

To enable it again

sudo launchctl enable system/com.apple.nfcd

Unfortunately, without disabling SIP, the bootout command does not work

sudo launchctl bootout system/com.apple.nfcd

 

[humpbacktwale]

Alright, I shall give these a try. What about determining what's actually starting it?

 

[bogdanw]

Try first
sudo launchctl blame system/com.apple.nfcd
It might tell why it's starting.

Unfortunately, I don’t think you can disable it without disabling SIP. In my virtual machine, the change made with launchctl disable did not persist after restart.

 

[humpbacktwale]

So using sudo launchctl blame system/com.apple.nfcd returns ipc (mach). What does this mean?