Posted on 10/01/2018 6:59:16 AM PDT by LibWhacker
It finally happened. The feds forced an Apple iPhone X owner to unlock their device with their face.
A child abuse investigation unearthed by Forbes includes the first known case in which law enforcement used Apple Face ID facial recognition technology to open a suspect's iPhone. That's by any police agency anywhere in the world, not just in America.
It happened on August 10, when the FBI searched the house of 28-year-old Grant Michalski, a Columbus, Ohio, resident who would later that month be charged with receiving and possessing child pornography. With a search warrant in hand, a federal investigator told Michalski to put his face in front of the phone, which he duly did. That allowed the agent to pick through the suspect's online chats, photos and whatever else he deemed worthy of investigation.
The case marks another significant moment in the ongoing battle between law enforcement and tech providers, with the former trying to break the myriad security protections put in place by the latter. Since the fight between the world's most valuable company and the FBI in San Bernardino over access to an iPhone in 2016, Forbes has been tracking the various ways cops have been trying to break Apple's protections.
First came multiple cases in which suspects were told to unlock iPhones with their fingerprints, via Apple's Touch ID biometric login. The same technique was then used on dead subjects.
(Excerpt) Read more at forbes.com ...
Ping.
Yes, and I think Apple continually improves the algorithm and processing to avoid this.
But two people with nearly identical facial features can potentially spoof the system.
It does get better over time as Apple updates the algorithm.
I do not like the whole FaceID thing, the touchid is great, convienent.. but on the new phones its the only option... Well they may be able to lock it down purely on code, and not use the faceid at all.. but then you lose all the conviences of not needing to enter a code.
I have been an iphone owner since the 3G, but now that FaceID has replaced Touch ID... I am not sure I will buy another.
But if I do I will never configure the faceID.... ever.
Hopefully they are continuing to work on touchID under the glass... and will return this feature... I know they couldn’t get it to work, so faceID was the route they went...
Somehow I doubt it though.
a photograph will not work.. it utilized 3 D to recognize your face... a picture will not do it... see the actual tech here
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g4m6StzUcOw
I would wager that the Forbes editor was just following the required stylebook.
It is now considered proper to use the plural "they/their" to avoid the specific gendered pronoun.
Do you think it would be possible to configure the face recognition such that it only recognized your face if you did something like put on glasses, or wink etc.? That would be a gesture only you would know.
As with so many things, you sacrifice security for convenience.
With how capable mobile processors are, they can calculate an incredible amount of data very quickly. Anti-spoofing technology was definitely a priority if Apple was going to permit it for mobile payments.
I suppose you could try to set it up with your eye blinked and then try it with eyes open and see how it works... but I doubt it will stop it, as the algorithm is simply a probability at the end of the day based no the inputs, its designed so that you can still open it if you have sunglasses on, or a hat, or you shave or grow a beard, so the wiggle room in the algorithm probably isn’t going to fail just because you wink or don’t wink.
It is good tech, identical twins generally cannot open each others phones with it.. but I just don’t like the whole concept of it... and like this story proves, you have no expectation of privacy to your face.
Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh
Yayayayayayyayayayaaaaaaaaaa
Uhhuyaya
Wow, interesting, thanks!
Its actually pretty secure... even identical twins get recognized as different individuals....
However, in the sort of situation where someone wants you to unlock your phone... You really can’t stop them.
They claim its 1 in 1,000,000 chance someone else would fool it... and a standard 6 digit code by pure guessing is obviously 1 in 1,000,000 as well, so its not so much any less secure from a random attack by someone trying to open the phone... but like this story shows, there is no privacy expectation of your face.
There was no need in this instance to use the plural.
I would appreciate seeing the stylebook notation that so requires.
Are you saying that if a man runs over a cat in the street, the stylebook allows (or requires) the man to be described as "they"?
The headline is illiterate no matter what the excuse; maybe the stylebook is too.
Yeah, I think FaceID is going to displace TouchID. I can see them building the FaceID camera arrays into their laptops/desktops too.
Me either! And I was looking forward to being able to say goodbye to passwords and pass phrases. But I guess that'll have to wait for quantum iPhones.
Touch ID does this, and is very convenient, but if you aren’t willing to use faceID all that convenience goes away, and you are back to using pins...
I have an iPhone 8 plus with Touch ID. You can disable Touch ID for unlocking the phone, but leave it enabled for apps that use it. That provides two factor authentication for those apps (somewhat).
He could unlock the milkman's phone too, which was a confusing finding.
The one-in-a-Million figure is irrelevant. The vulnerability is that people will use your own face to unlock your phone against your will.
Heck, I’ve been in enough fights where somebody used my face to unlock a door. It would be much less painful to have them use my face to unlock a phone.
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