Mystery Apple 'wireless device' turns out to be door access system

One of Apple's "wireless devices" recently submitted for approval by the U.S. Federal Communications Commission turns out to have been a door access system, likely for the Apple Park campus opening in April, according to a manual and photos published by the government body on Sunday.

The manual for model "A1844" — which supports both NFC and Bluetooth Low Energy — includes wiring instructions, and in fact says that users have to "present the company provided credential to the reader," Business Insider noted. The system will flash green or red and play a sound to indicate access.

The nature of the hardware is even more explicit in photos, which show a reader attached to a door assembly.

Apple Park — still under construction — was designed with the input of former CEO Steve Jobs, and is known to be feature many custom touches, such as extremely large panes of curved glass and the world's biggest natural ventilation system.

It's not known why Apple would want to design its own door system, but a probable reason is extra security, since a first-party system could be more resistant to hacking or tampering. The product is unlikely to be commercial, as while Apple created the HomeKit standard it doesn't sell any smarthome accessories.

In the past few months Apple has submitted two other wireless devices for FCC approval, identified as A1845 and A1846. Because they use related SKUs, it's possible that they're simply variants of the A1844 technology. Speculation has sometimes suggested that they could be things like the fifth-generation Apple TV.

22 Comments

williamh 13 Years · 1048 comments

About 7 years ago

I'm not saying the author's wrong, but would Apple require FCC approval for a device they don't ever intend to sell?

Soli 9 Years · 9981 comments

williamh said:

I'm not saying the author's wrong, but would Apple require FCC approval for a device they don't ever intend to sell?

Yes, since it's easily over 5 doors.

§ 15.23 Home-built devices.
(a) Equipment authorization is not required for devices that are not mar- keted[sic], are not constructed from a kit, and are built in quantities of five or less for personal use.
https://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/CFR-2010-title47-vol1/pdf/CFR-2010-title47-vol1-sec15-23.pdf (138 KB)

edit: This website might be easier to digest than trying to read a government PDF.

https://www.sparkfun.com/tutorials/398

edit2: I guess it's time to get out of the habit of denoting the size of a single file when websites are typically considerably larger and not an issue for either network speeds, data caps, or storage capacity. For example, the sparkfun.com webpage comes in at 1.95 MiB, according to Web Inspector in Safari.

mattinoz 9 Years · 2489 comments

So Apple doesn't trust electronic lock makers or is so they can use a different company issued token for different reasons?

If Apple doesn't trust lock makers why should anyone?

mattinoz said:

So Apple doesn't trust electronic lock makers or is so they can use a different company issued token for different reasons?

If Apple doesn't trust lock makers why should anyone?

I don't think it's a question of not trusting a "lock maker," or even not trusting a commercial computer-based security system, but rather seeing that they have more than enough door security systems to warrant using their own technologies to leverage something that is likely more secure and/or more cost effective.

cali 10 Years · 3494 comments

mattinoz said:

So Apple doesn't trust electronic lock makers or is so they can use a different company issued token for different reasons?

If Apple doesn't trust lock makers why should anyone?

It's Apple being Apple man.
They're involved with the whole design and have to innovate when the market can't deliver.