A lot of network and computer devices are protected at the hardware level, so an attacker has to perform hardware hacking to obtain access to digital informatios. First we'll see how to get physical access, then how to hack single devices and in the end to reverse engineering hardware.

Bump Keys can be used to force a keylock, when inserted a bump key position the pins in the lower part, then the attacker hit the key with a screwdriver in such a way the mechanical shock created moves the pins up and it is possible to open the lock. An experienced bumper can open the lock as quickly as a person with the correct key, also bumping doesn't damage the lock.

Some locks use a sidebar and angled pins to make normal picking and bumping ineffective, but the real countermeasure is to do not rely only on locks but to use two-factor authentication.

Access cards are of two varieties: Magnetic stripe cards and the RFID cards.

RFIDs are composed by a metal spiral that is an antenna, and a micro computer. The micro computer is powered trough the antenna. So the RFID reader power the microcomputer. When the reader is read returns his identity.

Each RFID system is composed by three elements: a tag, a reader and a database. ISO 18000 tries to unify EPC and ISO RFID standard.

They are composed by a magnetic stripe that contains data, there is no security measures used to protect data and no clear encoding. There is an ISO standard that specify three tracks of data. A magnetic reader and a software are needed to clone a magnetic card.

Sometimes the information stored in a magnetic card are protected by a checksum to protect them from tampering.

RFID cards use radio signals instead of magnetism, data can be read at a distance, and usually it is unencrypted, there are published techniques of misusage of RFID used to track people.

MiFare Classic is the most widely deployed secure RFID chips used for reasonably secure applications. Researcher managed to reverse engineering the encryption algorithm of MiFare, and they discovered that it was a very simple function, so they implemented a software that was capable to reverse the encryption.

Today RFID stores the private key, and a challenge response algorithm is used. Some use open algorithm, others proprietary.