Touch ID and Password Technology

[Huntn]

i've been using 1Password for almost a year now and just now realized what a boon Touch ID is to password technology (now that I have it on both my iPhone and MBP). I'm a slow learner, but it took an app that supports it. Having not to type out 30 character passwords is just... great! With this patented, I wonder how long before Apple competition can duplicate this?

Apple a Has Patented Some Crazy Upgrades To Touch ID

 

[jayducharme]

I've become very spoiled by Touch ID. There are still a few quirks. I'll randomly be prompted to manually enter my password, even when I've just used my iPhone or iPad. Sometimes it takes a few tries before the device seems to recognize my finger. My wife just got an iPhone 7 and the Touch ID on that seems really wonky, hardly ever recognizing her finger(s). But when it does work, it's fantastic.

 

[kdarling]

With this patented, I wonder how long before Apple competition can duplicate this?

Yeah, it looks like Apple was trying to patent ideas about embedding fingerprint readers in touchscreens, but a company named Privaris already had some.

So Apple bought 26 of Privaris' patents to block other companies from licensing them, similar to the way Apple bought Authentec for its fingerprint sensors, which everyone had been using for years. This slowed down the competition for a little while.

On a side note, it's interesting that some of the patents mention that "the most accurate but least common finger-scanning technology is ultrasound imaging", as Xiaomi released a smartphone using ultrasonic a few months ago. Looks like that method is the future.

 

[Huntn]

I'm wondering how long before some enterprising thieves figure out how to lift your fingerprint off your device and feed it into the fingerprint reader?
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Yeah, it looks like Apple was trying to patent ideas about embedding fingerprint readers in touchscreens, but a company named Privaris already had some.

So Apple bought 26 of Privaris' patents to block other companies from licensing them, similar to the way Apple bought Authentec for its fingerprint sensors, which everyone had been using for years. This slowed down the competition for a little while.

On a side note, it's interesting that some of the patents mention that "the most accurate but least common finger-scanning technology is ultrasound imaging", as Xiaomi released a smartphone using ultrasonic a few months ago. Looks like that method is the future.

I wonder what technology Apple uses for Touch ID, if it can be describes in a word like ultrasonic?

 

[kdarling]

I'm wondering how long before some enterprising thieves figure out how to lift your fingerprint off your device and feed it into the fingerprint reader?

For the current type of sensor, something like that was first done back around 2001.

Interesting question about ultrasonic though... is it just as easy to fool with the right hobby tools? The claim is that it provides a more detailed 3D image, a deeper one, and can more easily detect "liveness". Yet in the past, even sensors with such detection have been fooled by fake pulses, or even the pulse of the wearer of the fake print.

I wonder what technology Apple uses for Touch ID, if it can be describes in a word like ultrasonic?

The current Touch ID is an RF capacitive type. Those have been around since at least the late 1990s.

In Touch ID, it's a high resolution (500 DPI) array of tiny flat antennas. Similar to a touch panel, but much denser.

An RF signal is transmitted from the outer metal ring into your finger, and the signal levels (corresponding to your fingerprint ridges and valleys) are detected on each antenna "pixel" in the array, basically building a 3D (2D array of different values) image of your print.

Btw, the problem with a wet sensor, is that allows the RF signal to short circuit straight from the ring across the flat outside, making it more difficult to read the internal signals from the finger itself. Ultrasonic does not have that electrical problem of course.

 

[I7guy]

I've become very spoiled by Touch ID. There are still a few quirks. I'll randomly be prompted to manually enter my password, even when I've just used my iPhone or iPad. Sometimes it takes a few tries before the device seems to recognize my finger. My wife just got an iPhone 7 and the Touch ID on that seems really wonky, hardly ever recognizing her finger(s). But when it does work, it's fantastic.

I'm also spoiled. My wife doesn't use it on her phone, but I'm able to unlock my phone as I remove it from my pocket. Almost 100% hit rate for me.
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i've been using 1Password for almost a year now and just now realized what a boon Touch ID is to password technology (now that I have it on both my iPhone and MBP). I'm a slow learner, but it took an app that supports it. Having not to type out 30 character passwords is just... great! With this patented, I wonder how long before Apple competition can duplicate this?

Apple a Has Patented Some Crazy Upgrades To Touch ID

I thought this was reporting on the macrumors news forum, but I can't find the article.

 

[Tech198]

TouchID has transformed how i deal with passwords....

(have no idea what any of them are...). and if u ask me answers to my secret questions, i have no idea of those either.

I think the bigger question u gotta ask yourself, since we are using all Apple devices, would you even want to trust someone else? Third party app access are ok, because u'r still being stored on an iPhone....

Android has their option too.. but i can't see Google using the same technology for TouchID (exactly the same and just as secure using SecureEnclave) because u know they'd be a lawsuit round the corner.