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I still nod in disbelief when i see people unlocking with faceid. Apple may be privacy conscious, but they made face recognition cheap and ubiquitous. The perv
by cblconfederate 6y ago
I still nod in disbelief when i see people unlocking with faceid. Apple may be privacy conscious, but they made face recognition cheap and ubiquitous. The pervasive use of face recognition should be considered a mark of a prison state, a country where people don't trust each other and it is only held together under the watchful eye of the prison guards.
- toyg 6y agoIt also makes it trivial to unlock your phone under coercion. Same for fingerprints. Whereas nobody can (yet) get a code out of your brain.
- mids_hn 6y agoThey can, however, still coerce you to give away your text-based password. I agree, though, that slicing one's finger off is simpler for all parties.
- La1n 6y agohttps://xkcd.com/538/ https://xkcd.com/538/
- toyg 6y agoThe wrench can be resisted by determined individuals; whereas fingerprints and face-recog cannot.
- ChuckNorris89 6y agoThe wrench does not represent physical torture, but metaphorical, basically representing a pressure point tailored to each individual.
- pessimizer 6y agoPeople resist torture all of the time. The problem with torture is that there's often little reason to think that the torture would end if you give up the password, other than the word of the torturer.
- ChuckNorris89 6y agoLike I said, the wrench is not physical torture. By pressure point I meant things like blackmail, threats against your family or loved ones, etc. Everyone has something valuable to lose.
- toyg 6y agoYou don’t even need to slice, just manhandle. It’s easy and mechanical, can be done in a few minutes in a dark alley. Whereas a code, any code, requires a degree of cooperation that the individual can choose never to grant. (Obviously a lot of people will grant it, but a sufficiently motivated person - human-rights activist, political dissenter, journalist, etc etc - might not)
- munchbunny 6y agoIf we’re getting that deep into the hypotheticals, couldn’t said person just not set up biometric logins? For the rest of us where physical coercion to unlock the phone isn’t in the threat model, it really does improve on the trade offs between security and convenience. Feels disproportionate to say we should not do the latter because of the former.
- toyg 6y agoYour threat model likely involves simple robbery; making you “look here” is quick and painless, and increases the loot value significantly. And yes, biometrics in general are not good. The best protection remains a pin or passcode.
- munchbunny 6y agoIf they're going to physically threaten you into unlocking your phone, a PIN or passcode won't change that.
- pmontra 6y agoPickpocketers minimize any physical contact. Biometrics protect against them. PINs do not. Anecdotally I know about an iPhone that got unlocked after a theft at a party. It was protected by a PIN. The owner thinks that the pickpocketer learned the PIN by looking over his shoulder. On the other side burglars can get into a house and force people to unlock their phones or reveal their passwords, if they care to. There is no protection against that unless those people value their secrets more than the harm the burglars will do to them. All considered, I unlock with my fingerprints.
- ad404b8a372f2b9 6y agoWe're not talking about the same adversaries here. If the police unlock people's phone by pointing it at their face it'll be done with impunity and in a widespread manner. Less so if they start cutting off fingers.
- xxs 6y agoState actors would have zero issues lifting a fingerprint off a phone, then making a prop for the sensor. Alternatively all they need is a minor tranquilizer and there you go, provided the human asset is available.
- ad404b8a372f2b9 6y agoSorry I was unclear, I meant "cutting fingers" as an example of torture meant to extract passwords, not in the sense that they'd use the finger to unlock the phone. Face-ID and fingerprints share the same issues compared to a password.
- ajdude 6y agoIn the U.S. at least, passwords are protected under the 5th amendment but you can be ordered to unlock a phone with a fingerprint or a face since it's something you are and not something you know.
- Mediterraneo10 6y ago> passwords are protected under the 5th amendment This is not the case, at least, the law is not very settled in that direction. There has been at least one famous case [0] where an appeals court found that a defendant could be help in contempt of court and imprisoned for refusing to provide his password. [0] https://www.theregister.com/2017/03/20/appeals_court_contempt_passwords/ https://www.theregister.com/2017/03/20/appeals_court_contemp...
- xxs 6y agofingerprint is actually extra easy - the phone is plastered with them.
- zaychikk 6y agoThere are a number of ways to quickly disable faceid if you need to, the simplest being holding the power off buttons for just a few seconds.
- deleted 6y ago[deleted]