Many of you may come in here knowing the answer, but I’m sure most of you don’t. And, unlike most Androids, iPhones do not use the camera to identify our face and unlock the iPhone, something curious, but what makes it such a safe method.
It is very simple to try. You just have to cover the front camera of your iPhone and try to unlock it, you will see how it magically works. Of course, just cover the camera, if you cover the entire notch or dynamic island you will discover the trick, and that is where the sensor that collects and confirms our data is located.
How Face ID on an iPhone works
The system is quite simple, although Apple tries to explain it to us in a technical way that we may not understand perfectly, however, let’s take a look at it, so we can later comment on its actual operation:
The technology that makes Face ID possible includes some of the most advanced hardware and software we have ever created. The TrueDepth camera accurately captures facial data by projecting and analyzing thousands of invisible points that create a depth map of the face, from which it also obtains a infrared image. A part of the neural engine in the A11, A12 Bionic, A12X Bionic, A13 Bionic, A14 Bionic and A15 Bionic chips, protected in the Secure Enclave, transforms the depth map and infrared image into a mathematical representation and compares it with facial data corresponding.
As we see, it talks about the TrueDepth camera, which, although at first glance we do not see it in the notch or dynamic island, it would be there, and we can see it in the image that we leave you here. It would be a totally different second camerawith projection of “rays” that would analyze our face, it would be something like a laser meter, which can know the distance and depth of each part of us to analyze if we really still have 3,123 cm of nose or if the separation of the eyes is the same, among a thousand other metrics that would make it more difficult for someone like us to have a similar fingerprint. Hence Apple says that It is more secure than Touch ID.
If we use glasses or a mask, the iPhone itself detects it, since the rest of the parameters of your face continue to match, so, despite being less secure, since we have fewer confirmations, it continues to unlock it since it would be very difficult for someone to was exactly like you, except for the glasses or the mouth.
In short, Face ID does not use the front camera, but rather an infrared and laser camera, which is why It also works at nightsince it does not really need to see our face, but rather analyze the distances and shapes of it, which it does by measurements, not by reasonable similarity or any other method, and hence a photo will not serve to unlock Face ID, since she will take it as a simple piece of paper and you will not be able to deceive her, unless you make a 3D model of that person, then things change.
