Aspects described herein provide for hardening an RF signature by dynamically utilizing a sending device carrier frequency offset (CFO) as part of the RF signature. The CFO and the CFO varying pattern of wireless devices observed. A radio frequency signature at a sending device is paired to a frequency offset estimation algorithm at a receiving device, the final CFO estimation error may be bounded to a small range for various applications and communication protocols, and utilized to properly identify the sending device at the receiving device.