“It was a memorable moment in Pixar’s 2004 classic ‘The Incredibles,’ one that seemed wildly futuristic at the time: Mr. Incredible picks up a wafer-thin tablet computer, and it scans his face to verify his identity before divulging his secret mission,” Christopher Mims reports for The Wall Street Journal. “Thirteen years later, many slim phones and tablets unlock with the press of a thumb—and just this sort of mobile facial scanning is on the way.”
“While Apple hasn’t announced any use of this technology — let alone confirmed whether it will exist inside the widely expected 10th-anniversary iPhone — the company is no stranger to infrared depth-mapping and facial recognition,” Mims reports. “It has previously been granted patents describing nearly identical processes. Apple declined to comment on any technology it might be working on.”
“Depth-sensing technology, generally called ‘structured light,’ sprays thousands of tiny infrared dots across a person’s face or any other target. By reading distortions in this field of dots, the camera gathers superaccurate depth information. Since the phone’s camera can see infrared but humans can’t, such a system could allow the phone to unlock in complete darkness,” Mims reports. “Since Apple’s existing fingerprint sensor can already verify payments in stores via Apple Pay, it makes sense that Apple’s phones could also enable payments through face recognition in the future.”
Read more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: And it will be very secure.
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Apple’s 3D Face ID will recognize user’s face within millionths of a second – August 21, 2017
Apple’s leaked HomePod firmware shows iPhone 8 likely to abandon Touch ID in favor of ‘Pearl ID’ facial recognition – August 3, 2017