iPhone X Face ID Security Concerns

Más Face ID Sensitivity, Más Problems

There are several privacy concerns regarding the Face ID. The facial recognition technology is quite impressive but offers one big problem: what is to stop law enforcement from opening your phone by holding it in front of your face?

The U/X Idea

Grant iPhone X users the option to require a unique facial gesture to unlock the phone.

Blog Categories

The User Experience Problem

On the low end, the Face ID is too sensitive. If you simply want to look at your phone to see a notification or check the time, the phone will open. This is annoying and can be avoided by opting to require a passcode to open the phone instead. But if you opt for the pass code, then what’s the advantage to using Face ID especially since there is no Touch ID?

On the high end, Face ID opens up the door for privacy concerns. Sure, the phone won’t open if someone holds the phone to your face while sleeping since your eyes are closed. But what if you are arrested,  police confiscate your phone, and law enforcements tricks you to looking at your phone and voila! Your phone is unlocked without your consent. It is a matter of time before an event like this happens, which opens the floodgate for privacy concerns and potential legal battles.

The U/X Solution

Grant iPhone X users the option to unlock their phone with Face ID but only if they make a specific gesture. Now the user has 3 security options to unlock their phone: normal Face ID, Face ID with Gesture, or passcode.

If a facial gesture is required to open the phone, it will prevent the phone from opening when you just want to check it and, more importantly, will prevent law enforcement from opening your phone if you accidentally just look at it.

Each user can make a unique facial gesture to open the phone. This may also help with identical twins (yes, identical twins are not supposed to be able to unlock the other’s iPhone X but this has been disputed).

As a further option, users could adopt different gestures to open different areas of the phone. Examples could be raising your eyebrows takes you to the home screen while winking opens up the camera.

Conclusion

iPhone X is very powerful but leads to potential privacy concerns such as law enforcement tricking you to unlock your phone. And with daily usage, the phone opens up too easily for some users which can be frustrating.

Enabling the option to open the iPhone X with a specific facial gesture alleviates the privacy concerns as well as the daily usage frustrations. As a product iteration, enabling different facial gestures to open up different areas of your phone can create unique efficiencies for a better user experience.

Sharing is Caring!