The author | pigeons


When Apple unveiled the iPhone X in the early hours of September 13, one of the most talked-about features of the device was its Face ID, or Face swipe.

These days, in the circle of friends, mobile phone + face this hot flood.

On Monday, the day xiaomi released its Note3 face-swiping phone, AI tech base wrote about four ways that face-swiping phones can be easily cracked, and that as face-swiping technology becomes more and more popular, it’s no longer possible to have your own privacy.

Today, taking advantage of this hot spot, battalion commander again from the technical level, to thoroughly analyze the mobile phone brush face this matter.

There are interviews with industry insiders, news from Apple’s launch event, and relevant foreign translations. AI Tech Base is only responsible for laying out viewpoints fairly, not taking sides.

Question 1: What’s behind Apple’s Face ID?

                     

In the apple bangs, look for these four symbols: The Infrared camera,Dot projector, Flood Illuminator, and Front camera play an important role in Face ID, the iPhone’s face-washing function.

Face ID works by projecting more than 30,000 invisible points of light onto a user’s Face through a Dot projector at the top of the screen, creating a depth map specific to your Face that is then stored. When unlocked, Apple will project infrared light, invisible to the face, from the bangs and read a 3D geometric map of the user’s face, which can be compared with the stored face data. If the picture is similar, it will be unlocked successfully.

Apple has developed a Neural Engine to better match real-time facial data.

According to related media, citing an interview with Kuangshi Technology,
This principle of apple is different from the xiaomi Note3 just released.

It is reported that the mi Note3 uses a 2D face unlock solution, such a solution for flat photos, video faces, or sleeping faces, it is also possible to unlock.

Apple’s approach, called structured light dual imaging, is good enough to identify such planar attacks. And brushing your face with your eyes closed won’t unlock it. In addition, Cook said Face ID was able to tell when he changed his hair, put on glasses, or put on a hat. This is one step closer to living detection

So what about the face masks in mission: Impossible movies? Is it possible to unlock a lookalike?

About this problem, the battalion commander will make a detailed analysis in the fourth problem — the security analysis of mobile phone face brushing.

In addition, the battalion commander explained more about the structured light mentioned in the article and talked about three technologies in 3D sensing:
Structured light, time of flight (TOF) and binocular vision.

Structural light is a kind of 3D sensing principle. Structured light, in plain English, is directed at a surface and a camera is used to scan the pattern of structured light reflected off the surface.

Apple bought PrimeSense, an Israeli company, in 2013.

                        

Apple bought the company for $300 million in 2013. The company is the granddaddy of 3D sensors. The company’s core technology is speckle ranging with structured light.

The dot matrix projectors that Apple uses today are almost certainly from the beginning of this technology.

What about the flight time?

This is close to radar. By measuring the time difference between light pulse emission and return, the 3d position information of the object can be read.

It’s worth noting that PrimeSense worked with Microsoft on the first Kinect. But the relationship broke down and PrimeSense was acquired by Apple, leaving Microsoft to reinvent the wheel with its second Kinect: time of flight.

Binocular vision is relatively simple, and the principle is similar to the human eye, through the parallax between the two cameras to determine the distance depth.

Taken together, the three methods provide better time-of-flight accuracy and stability, but lower power consumption of structured light. The accuracy of the eyes is not as good as the first two.

That way, you can compare apple’s and Xiaomi’s face-swiping phones more clearly. Mi Note3 belongs to binocular recognition. Because it belongs to passive light rather than active emitting light source, its recognition will be poor in dark light. Apple doesn’t have that problem.

Despite a major technological overhaul, is Apple’s latest face brush really as wacky as it claims, with a one in a million error rate?

Is the error rate really only one in a million?

Next, let’s talk about the second question. Is apple’s iPhone X only one in a million times wrong?

At the event, the APPLE CEO’s first face swipe failed to unlock the device, causing awkward moments.

Why can’t you unlock it?

Maybe it was the intense light at the back of the conference. It’s not clear why, but the phone does have a bruise.In near infrared light or strong sunlight, the face may not be visible and the lock may not be unlocked.

Because when an iPhone is unlocked, it emits infrared light. When the wavelength of light is close to infrared light, it will interfere with the recognition process, and the unlock fails.

In addition, high sunlight contains all wavelengths of light, including infrared, so a phone may not be able to unlock when it is charged up front in the middle of a sunny day. However, the battalion commander has not yet been given the phone to conduct specific tests, this is just theory.

Many people have complained to AI Tech Base that Apple is going too far, eliminating fingerprint recognition altogether and making it difficult to use.

As for the one in a million success rate that Cook is talking about, it’s probably just the recognition rate at the level of a software algorithm, obviously the actual recognition rate in the application. He cleverly avoids preconditions, which is a clever PR concept.

Question three: Is it really more convenient than fingerprint identification?

In terms of recognition rates, yes!

At the event, Mr. Cook said Face ID was more secure than Touch ID, which has a 1 in 50,000 chance of being cracked, compared with 1 in a million.

Of course, there are times when this is worse than fingerprinting. There are better times than fingerprinting. The fingerprint id will unlock the phone when you reach for your pocket, but face id requires you to pull your phone out and point it at your face.

However, one thing is for sure, now that Apple, the flag-bearer, has made this big move, the domestic mobile phone manufacturers will follow suit. Whether you prefer fingerprint recognition or face recognition, you’re running out of options.

According to many insiders, Kuangshi technology has ALL IN mobile face brushing project, and Sensetime is also increasing staff to support mobile face brushing. At present, Kuangshi technology has won the face swiping project of Xiaomi phones, while Sensetime has won the face recognition business of Oppo. Recently, the two are engaged in fierce competition for Vivo project.

Is biometrics really more secure than passwords?

Historically, biometrics have been insecure.

Cameras can be tricked.

Sound can be recorded.

Fingerprints can be deactivated.

And in many countries, including the United States, police can legally force you to use your fingerprint to unlock your phone. So, they can also force you to swipe your face to unlock your phone, whether you want to or not. Of course, with the bad guy, the robber doesn’t care about the details of whether it’s legal or whether you’re willing.

At the same time, biometric identification is cracked from time to time.

In 2007, Matt Damon cracked secure voice and fingerprint biometrics in order to get all the information on Project Black Rose in the Bourne Ultimatum, using a method that best illustrates the problems inherent in biometrics:

Take the more complex iris recognition: with millions of cells in the human retina, each person’s retina is unique. That’s pretty high-end biometrics, isn’t it?

                                                         

But in May, the latest iris unlock on Samsung’s Galaxy S8 was cracked by some security researchers. They use printers and contact lenses to get information from your iris.

If a hacker gets hold of your iris, if a hacker gets hold of your fingerprint, if a hacker gets hold of your face, with the right methods, they can crack any system that uses that information as a password.

Once hackers get hold of your DNA sequence, as in the Arnold Schwarzenegger movie “Day Six,” it’s not impossible that they can use it to clone another version of you.

All because your biometric information cannot be changed. If you lose your password, you can change it and continue using the device. Without iris, fingerprint or face shape, it’s hard to change your eyes, fingers or face shape and move on…

In fact, 89 percent of iPhone users only use their fingerprint to access their phone without using a password. However, when your Alipay, wechat Pay and Bitcoin wallet are unlocked with Touch ID, “while sleeping… The money is gone. “It’s just a matter of when it happens.

But by default on iOS, you can read incoming text messages without locking your phone. When you buy an App from the App Store, by default, it requires you to enter a long, complicated password to confirm the purchase. This is a separation of “read” and “write” permissions.

Conversely, using a fingerprint to unlock everything makes it look secure… But how much difference can there be in the logic of “read” and “write” permissions compared to not using passwords everywhere? So let’s wait until Apple figures out the logic…

Plus, if you’ve already given up your fingerprints to avoid the “80 times a day” chore, do you really want to give up your face, too?