Hi, I'm the author behind the article referenced in this post.

As far as I know, Ubiquiti is not responsible for this 5$ per year "tax".

Apple takes about 3$ per user per year for usage of "Apple Access Platform", and the rest is spent for licensing the credential technology, like to NXP for Mifare DESFire in this case.

This is amazing. :) Small world!

I was testing my new Hikvision keypad against every card I have and wondering if I could use Apple Express Transit, when I stumbled upon your writeup. Looking forward to trying out a T-Union card later!

They could not implement "Home Key", because Apple requires that compatible devices are implemented as a single unit, containing reader + lock.

This limitation was added precisely as to prevent HomeKey from cannibalizing that sweet recurring revenue from "Apple Access Platform" targeted at business customers, as companies want detached readers which can be hooked into existing PACS architectures.

There was a device which did not follow that rule - the Aqara U200 but it seems like they had spent a lot of time arguing with Apple to get approval, as there were multiple occasions where they promised HomeKey (thus generating lots of hype and pressure), and then came back on that promise. Although they delivered on it in the end, good for them.

It's SSO tax applied to hardware devices. But at the same time, it's clearly a more premium feature and if you're a business you've got the $5000/year to pay for 1000 devices. $5/device/year is not exactly expensive. Heck, I'd pay Ubiquiti $15/year for my family to be able to use it at home. That's less than I pay for almost any subscription for anything.

$5/year… this year. They will add a “No SOC2 compliance, please upgrade to our $19pm solution and benefit from 10% if you subscribe annually”.

It’s sad that we have to assume this is the agenda for all offerings that don’t allow paying current price x years in advance (possibly including adjustion for expected inflation). Leaves a very sour taste, especially in the case of hardware devices

Then you can stop using it, and you're no worse off than before when the choice wasn't even available.

What I can’t figure out is why the old readers, which clearly read NFC cards, can’t work to read iPhones, which emit NFC.

I understood in the past that iPhones weren’t supported because of the limitations described in the article. I figured once Apple opened up the system and Ubiquiti actually implemented it (both of which have now happened) that the old readers would work.

Although irritating, I’d consider paying $5/user/year, but I’m not about to rip out 6 card readers that I just installed.

The reason why only the G3 supports Apple Wallet is exactly because of the NFC chip. Otherwise, they are completely the same hardware, and mostly the same software.

Thing is, the PN7160 chip used in G2 does not support Apple's proprietary extension to the NFC standard, called Apple Enhanced Contactless Polling [1], so they had to replace it with the PN7161 version, which is a special SKU created by NXP in collaboration with Apple. ECP modifies the lower levels of the NFC stack, which "NFC Controller" chips do not always give the host full control over, as they abstract away the protocol implementation for use in non realtime systems. Hence the need to replace the chip.

Funnily enough, PN7160 and PN7161 is exactly the same hardware with exactly the same firmware. NXP just 'fused' some extra data into *1 model so that it does not ignore the special configuration command to enable ECP. The extra SKU exists only because of licensing, and could have been a firmware update instead.

Theoretically, as ECP is really only needed for the automatic selection & use of a card, and it does not affect the upper protocol layers, UI could have brought support for Wallet credentials to older readers, just without the "express mode", but Apple specifically prohibits the use of their cards with any non-certified and non-ecp readers.

[1] https://github.com/kormax/apple-enhanced-contactless-polling

Thank you for the detailed answer!

> It just seems like a slow boil into subscriptions for a company whose entire value prop is prosumer networking without the contracts.

On the other side... look at the status quo in access control systems. If you never did, be happy you never had to because the status quo is shit because the entire ecosystem is suffering from a severe lack of money - for physical locks, most people buy the cheapest shit they can get at Home Depot or whatnot, and for "fancy" stuff involving smartphones they do just the same, or order right from Alibaba. And that is a damn horror show.

Ubiquiti, for all I dislike the trend for recurring revenue everywhere, at least makes high quality and secure stuff - but with anything interconnected, keeping updates available costs recurring expenses. So it's either "the product is cheap ass and will likely have multiple bypasses in a year or two", "the product is extremely expensive but you will get updates for a reasonable time" or "the product is affordable, but costs recurring money".

Definitely, but it really irks me that part of that money goes to Apple for... what exactly?

I already paid for my iPhone! Why should my apartment building/employer/... have to pay a yearly fee to allow me to enter a building using it?

For Apple, the same thing applies. Keeping an entire zoo of operating systems safe from malicious entities requires serious work that needs to be funded somehow.