I’ve been living with my iPhone 5s for about a week now. I have to say, the fingerprint scanner is incredible. I have two fingers registered, my left thumb (I am left-handed) and my right index finger (for when I use a two handed approach). About 80% of the time, I press and release the home button, and my phone recognizes my touch, opens up instantly. The other 20% of the time, I have to reposition my finger once or twice, and that does the trick. Even in that worst case, I’m in quicker than if I typed in my access code. This is some really well designed technology.
As has been widely reported, Touch-ID is based on technology developed by AuthenTec, a company Apple purchased in July, 2012 for about $356 million.
AuthenTec cofounder Scott Moody gave a presentation this week on the technology behind TouchID.
“We’re looking at pores, structures of ridges and valleys, and instantaneously tell who you are,” Moody said. “Every time you use it, it learns more about you. Because it knows, ‘This is Alex,’ every time you use it gets easier and easier.”
If you’ve ever played with any other fingerprint sensors, you can really appreciate the elegance of the AuthenTec solution. There’s no swiping, no awkward angles. As with all the best tech, it just works.
I’m very much looking forward to using this someday.
Similar topic: I am really interested how HTC tried to solve all the problems Apple has been criticized for with Touch ID, all the “OH NOES, Apple stores full fingerprints on the devices and shares them also with the NSA” stuff.
I mean, we already know from the The Verge review that the fingerprint reader in the HTC One Max is awkward to use and doesn’t really work reliable enough.
Instead of having a “Secure Enclave”, they’re probabling storing the saved fingerprints as a .jpg in the root folder 😛
Like Gruber pointed out in his 5s review, though, it really kind of hinges on your covering the entire metal ring with your finger or thumb print. When I’m cautious about this, accuracy is incredible. When I’m less cautious, it plummets. I just wonder how many average consumers are going to read about or figure this out?
It has worked flawlessly and quickly for me.
I still have one of the AuthenTec fingerprint micro-readers that plugs into a USB port on my MBP. I got it like two weeks before the Apple acquisition for $ 5 off the AuthenTec website… Still works like a champ….