Go Deep! (How 3D cameras are about to change mobile security forever...)
If you leaf through old issues of Popular Mechanics, you’ll see plenty of stories about The Future, from self-cleaning houses to flying cars. Most of these innovations have remained at the fringes of technology, but there’s one item that people have actually tried to build for decades: the 3D camera. The first 3D film was made more than 100 years ago, but for most of the last century the ability to make a compact, quality device to take pictures that show depth has remained tantalizingly out of reach.
Until now.
2018 is going to be the year when mobile devices will finally include 3D cameras. Apple is (not so) secretly working on one for the iPhone 8, and other manufacturers are also lining up to onboard them onto their newest phones and tablets. And while most consumers are excited about being able to show their duck-lip selfies in three dimensions, the real value is going to be behind the scenes. Simply put, the 3D camera will allow mobile security to go to a completely new level. Here’s why:
Every mobile security device ever invented has been hacked. From gummy bears on fingerprint readers to “unbreakable” passwords that can be cracked in milliseconds, it’s just too easy to access a tablet or smartphone without permission. Camera phones were supposed to change all that – after all, what could be harder to fake than a person’s face – but it only took a few weeks for some enterprising pranksters to use pictures and videos to fool a phone into thinking that an authorized user was trying to use his or her device.
3D imaging eliminates the ability to use 2D images to hack devices because it can register facial curves and other metrics that simply can’t be picked up on regular cameras. In fact, professional-grade biometric-based readers have been doing this for several years, but it’s never been practical for most of the security protocols we use every day at home, at work, or on the road.
That’s all about to change. Unfortunately, most of the device makers are so focused on the selfies, portraits, or measuring a room that they aren’t thinking about security. But we are. That’s why we just introduced 3DVerify, the first software designed to enable facial recognition using 3D cameras. It’s not the next big thing…yet.