4 ms·

There is a way to quickly disable face id, presumably you would do so in most situations when facing police.

Fnoord 9y ago
There's also a way to break in your house whilst you're gone or asleep. In the former case, if the device is in your house, would you've disabled FaceID? In the latter case, would you've disabled FaceID? Would you've disabled FaceID when you were going outside (with your device) and you'd be busted then? Answer in all these cases: Of course not. So a PIN alone would've been more secure. It'd have cost the government more effort to crack. A strong password or TOTP would've been a better solution. Pref. 2FA w/both. You could use FaceID as 2FA, but then people need to keep in mind that its a very weak chain in the 2FA. They still need a strong other factor ie. a strong password.
- dkonofalski 9y ago
  That doesn't really make sense. If they take your phone while you're gone or asleep, FaceID is worthless to the attacker anyways because they'd either not be attentive or they wouldn't have your face at all. On top of that, FaceID disables itself and requires a passcode after 4 hours of no detection or 48 hours of continuous time that the phone hasn't been unlocked. Either way, you'd be covered. The only situation where this is actually an issue is where you're being compelled, on the spot, to unlock your phone and you haven't had the time to click the side buttons (which would be very rare since it would just require you to squeeze both sides and you'd have the chance to do that while performing the action of handing your phone over).
  - Fnoord 9y ago
    > On top of that, FaceID disables itself and requires a passcode after 4 hours of no detection or 48 hours of continuous time that the phone hasn't been unlocked. You know how and where Ross Anderson was busted? This is peanuts to beat. You bust the target whilst they're on a dinner having a drink, or right after they went asleep. The government knows your current position, and knows when you're asleep. Once this has become the status quo, rest assured cops with a police warrant wouldn't enter anymore at 6 AM right before you wake up but at 1 AM right after you went asleep (but before your FaceID would time out). > (which would be very rare since it would just require you to squeeze both sides and you'd have the chance to do that while performing the action of handing your phone over). Law enforcement will adapt very quickly to that if this becomes the status quo. They'll first and foremost bust your hands, so that you are unable to lock your phone. Then they hold the phone before you and voila, unlocked.
    - GhostVII 9y ago
      With any sort of password or authentication, you can just wait for the person to take out their phone and start using it, and then grab it from them. Not exactly difficult. If you are so concerned about security that you think there is a good chance someone is going to physically attack you to get into your phone, you should just assume someone will get into your phone eventually, and don't keep any sensitive data on it. For the other 99.9999% of the population, face id is good enough.
      - Fnoord 9y ago
        The problem with phone security nowadays isn't merely the data people have on the phones, its the data people have in the cloud as well with passwords being saved on the device. > If you are so concerned about security that you think there is a good chance someone is going to physically attack you to get into your phone, you should just assume someone will get into your phone eventually, and don't keep any sensitive data on it. For the other 99.9999% of the population, face id is good enough. I don't understand this statistic. Are you arguing 99.9999% of all phones aren't a potential target of being stolen? Are you arguing 99.9999% of all people's data isn't interesting to authorities? You're being overly optimistic about FaceID.
        GhostVII 9y ago
        > I don't understand this statistic. Are you arguing 99.9999% of all phones aren't a potential target of being stolen? Are you arguing 99.9999% of all people's data isn't interesting to authorities? You're being overly optimistic about FaceID. No, I'm saying that, for effectively everyone, there are way easier ways to get into their phone than through FaceID, for example by just taking their phone while they are using it. So for effectively everyone, FaceID will not change their security risk, because there is no motivation for anyone to try and bypass their FaceID when there are easier attack vectors - especially when you are able to disable FaceID the second you feel you are being threatened.
    - taneq 9y ago
      If you have anything on your phone that's valuable / incendiary enough that the government is willing to SWAT you to get at it... don't use goddamn biometrics. In encryption terms, logging in with biometrics is "vs. kid sister" security, not "vs. major government" security.

There's also a way to break in your house whilst you're gone or asleep. In the former case, if the device is in your house, would you've disabled FaceID? In the latter case, would you've disabled FaceID? Would you've disabled FaceID when you were going outside (with your device) and you'd be busted then? Answer in all these cases: Of course not. So a PIN alone would've been more secure. It'd have cost the government more effort to crack. A strong password or TOTP would've been a better solution. Pref. 2FA w/both. You could use FaceID as 2FA, but then people need to keep in mind that its a very weak chain in the 2FA. They still need a strong other factor ie. a strong password.

dkonofalski 9y ago
That doesn't really make sense. If they take your phone while you're gone or asleep, FaceID is worthless to the attacker anyways because they'd either not be attentive or they wouldn't have your face at all. On top of that, FaceID disables itself and requires a passcode after 4 hours of no detection or 48 hours of continuous time that the phone hasn't been unlocked. Either way, you'd be covered. The only situation where this is actually an issue is where you're being compelled, on the spot, to unlock your phone and you haven't had the time to click the side buttons (which would be very rare since it would just require you to squeeze both sides and you'd have the chance to do that while performing the action of handing your phone over).
- Fnoord 9y ago
  > On top of that, FaceID disables itself and requires a passcode after 4 hours of no detection or 48 hours of continuous time that the phone hasn't been unlocked. You know how and where Ross Anderson was busted? This is peanuts to beat. You bust the target whilst they're on a dinner having a drink, or right after they went asleep. The government knows your current position, and knows when you're asleep. Once this has become the status quo, rest assured cops with a police warrant wouldn't enter anymore at 6 AM right before you wake up but at 1 AM right after you went asleep (but before your FaceID would time out). > (which would be very rare since it would just require you to squeeze both sides and you'd have the chance to do that while performing the action of handing your phone over). Law enforcement will adapt very quickly to that if this becomes the status quo. They'll first and foremost bust your hands, so that you are unable to lock your phone. Then they hold the phone before you and voila, unlocked.
  - GhostVII 9y ago
    With any sort of password or authentication, you can just wait for the person to take out their phone and start using it, and then grab it from them. Not exactly difficult. If you are so concerned about security that you think there is a good chance someone is going to physically attack you to get into your phone, you should just assume someone will get into your phone eventually, and don't keep any sensitive data on it. For the other 99.9999% of the population, face id is good enough.
    - Fnoord 9y ago
      The problem with phone security nowadays isn't merely the data people have on the phones, its the data people have in the cloud as well with passwords being saved on the device. > If you are so concerned about security that you think there is a good chance someone is going to physically attack you to get into your phone, you should just assume someone will get into your phone eventually, and don't keep any sensitive data on it. For the other 99.9999% of the population, face id is good enough. I don't understand this statistic. Are you arguing 99.9999% of all phones aren't a potential target of being stolen? Are you arguing 99.9999% of all people's data isn't interesting to authorities? You're being overly optimistic about FaceID.
      - GhostVII 9y ago
        > I don't understand this statistic. Are you arguing 99.9999% of all phones aren't a potential target of being stolen? Are you arguing 99.9999% of all people's data isn't interesting to authorities? You're being overly optimistic about FaceID. No, I'm saying that, for effectively everyone, there are way easier ways to get into their phone than through FaceID, for example by just taking their phone while they are using it. So for effectively everyone, FaceID will not change their security risk, because there is no motivation for anyone to try and bypass their FaceID when there are easier attack vectors - especially when you are able to disable FaceID the second you feel you are being threatened.
  - taneq 9y ago
    If you have anything on your phone that's valuable / incendiary enough that the government is willing to SWAT you to get at it... don't use goddamn biometrics. In encryption terms, logging in with biometrics is "vs. kid sister" security, not "vs. major government" security.