Slashdot Mirror
Apple Tests 3-D Face Scanning To Unlock Next iPhone: Bloomberg (bloomberg.com)
Five years ago, Apple made fingerprint scanners on smartphones popular. Now the company may have found a better technology to replace it. According to Mark Gurman of Bloomberg, the Cupertino-based company is exploring 3D facial detection as a replacement for Touch ID fingerprint authentication. From the article: This is powered by a new 3-D sensor, added the people, who asked not to be identified discussing technology that's still in development. The company is also testing eye scanning to augment the system, one of the people said. The sensor's speed and accuracy are focal points of the feature. It can scan a user's face and unlock the iPhone within a few hundred milliseconds, the person said. It is designed to work even if the device is laying flat on a table, rather than just close up to the face. The feature is still being tested and may not appear with the new device. However, the intent is for it to replace the Touch ID fingerprint scanner, according to the person.
So... yeah... fuck Apple. Again. Phone should be a phone, not everything else but a good phone.
So to unlock your phone in the middle of the night, you need to shine a bright light in your face and get your picture taken?
Fingerprints made sense, you use your finger to tap the home button. Having to lift up the phone to your face to unlock IS NOT user friendly and sounds like a complete pain in the ass.
Apple is just daring us to tell them to go fuck themselves. And it's about time we did
Tim Cook needs to be dragged the fuck out of there -- he's forcing change for change sake to try to hide the fact he has no fucking creativity at all. You'd think that'd been evident after the removal of the headphone jack
So to unlock your phone in the middle of the night, you need to shine a bright light in your face and get your picture taken?
Why would you assume a dedicated 3D sensor would need visible light? Or more than the screen light that they already use as a selfie flash?
Even the quality of AC's has diminished on Slashdot these days, and that's saying something!
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
I'm waiting until they use 3D rectal scanning. It will be FAB! YOU! LOUS!
to find out if you have a 3-D face
It's happened before. It can happen again.
Apple is raising the bar, but the problem with biometric authentication is always the same: once someone has made a 3D copy of your face, you cannot revoke your authentication credentials. You cannot change your face. Not easily at least.
And someone will make a 3D copy of a face that defeats this feature, and you will find a tutorial on the Internet explaining how to do it to average Joe.
Broken noses, missing teeth, bruised skin, hands on your neck forcing you to look into your phone? All the obvious signs of violence.
FFS - biometrics are only usernames, not passwords. They only answer who you are, not what you know/have.
There is zero guarantee that when the mug is shown you are in possession of the phone.
Why doesn't that pederast Timmy get that?
Even if they have a dedicated ASIC, this will kill battery life. Most likely will implement some pruned CNN like squeezenet under the hood to compare the two depth maps (authorized user vs. unknown user).
Round 1: is there a face in the cameras field of view? =>Low-processing power haar classifier
If(yes):
Round 2: activate IR depth scanner and compare depth maps
else: do nothing/stay locked
Once again Apple adds a feature other phones already have and act like they invented it. They need to change their motto from "Think different" [sic] to "Me too, me too"
I don't use the finger print sensor, it's not that useful a sensor for other purposes (that I've seen). But this does sound promising if it can be used to get basic 3-d scans of objects.
How about identical twins or just very similar looking people? It seems to be the sort of technology that would either be too lenient or too strict.
Just more insidious. Use your face to lock your phone. Get arrested by police. Police just hold your phone up to your face, no password needed.
It's bad enough that in the winter I have to take a glove off to unlock the phone and use it. Now I'll have to take whatever I have keeping my face/ears warm off to unlock the phone and then my glove off to use it. Of course I'll still be use my 5s whenever this comes out because I refuse to pay full price for phones that have reduced feature sets. For example the SE doesn't have all of the touch screen features of the existing models when it was introduced. Apple just didn't want to sacrifice sales of their larger phones.
So, no more refusing to give your fingerprint to consent to having your phone unlocked after it's been seized or taken by someone unauthorized, I suppose? They just point it at your face and voila, all your info is theirs to read.
I suppose you could make distorted faces at them to prevent it from happening... until you get tired.
This seems like *less* control over your device.
Am I supposed to point my phone at my face discreetly in the middle of a meeting? I can use a fingerprint sensor with the phone still in my pocket or under the table.
Democracy is two wolves and a sheep voting on lunch.
So do you have to 're-sync' your face with your phone if you didn't shave, or grew / removed a beard, or had / resolved weight issues? Further, with 3D printers becoming ever cheaper and more capable, hacking this sounds even easier than the gelatin fingerprint hack.
I seem to recall, and am currently too lazy to dig up, a story on /. awhile back about some company that could make a *very* realistic 3D printed mask of anyone for anyone. I don't know if anyone had tested them with face recognition systems yet.
It's "lying flat on a table", not "laying". Get your English right!
Unless it's a chicken of course. Then it can lay.
At least the police will have to leave your face alone to be able to unlock your phone ;)
Given the obvious security hole of just-point-at-the-face-and-it-unlocks I bet they'll require a specific facial movement to confirm it like some cards (Mastercard for one) do with using selfies (blink, smile, whatever). I'm not advocating it or even saying using biometrics as the main password is a good idea, but I'm seeing a lot of comments where people are afraid that it's just point-and-unlock and I wanted to bring a different perspective to the table based off of what we currently have.
News at 11
Apple engineers are under intense pressure to come up with the "next big thing." Unfortunately, they can't really think of anything, because they live in an Apple box. So, they come up with kewl new features that get headlines but that no one actually needs.
It's new! It's new! It's new! Buy our New and Improved product. Wheaties now better than ever!
I love Touch ID. I use it all the time. I have a 15+ character passcode, and the only reason that is convenient is because of Touch ID. But a system that a) canâ(TM)t work in the dark and b) works in the light even without your consent isnâ(TM)t more convenient OR secure. I have no idea why Iâ(TM)d want this.
That said, this is all conjecture. Hopefully the real products this year keep Touch ID or something similar. I wonâ(TM)t stop using iOS products, but this isnâ(TM)t anything I can get excited over.
same
Like anyone can even know that