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Claim 7 in this patent application describes how depth sensors are used as part of an image authentication process, which would make such a workaround more diff

Claim 7 in this patent application describes how depth sensors are used as part of an image authentication process, which would make such a workaround more difficult: https://image-ppubs.uspto.gov/dirsearch-public/print/downloadPdf/20260268025 https://image-ppubs.uspto.gov/dirsearch-public/print/downloa... The Apple Reference Image feature is here launched on iPhone 18 Pro and iPhone 18 Pro Max that both have built-in LiDAR sensors that could be used for this process.

geokon 16d ago
furthermore, couldnt you do parallax from the multiple cameras as well as flicker the flash? seems pretty easy to make it sufficiently difficult to trick the system
BugsJustFindMe 16d ago
iPhone lidar only works up to like 16 feet in the easiest lighting conditions (indoors) and may be functionally ineffective outdoors.
- pveierland 16d ago
  Still, that means that either the fake target scene and your screen presenting it would need to be outside of LiDAR sensor bounds, or you'd need to find a way to make the depth sensor data conform with your fake scene, both increasing the difficulty of producing a forgery.
  - BugsJustFindMe 16d ago
    https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49721878 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49721878 > increasing the difficulty of producing a forgery The problem with this thinking is twofold: 1) Whether it actually meaningfully increases the difficulty of a forgery remains to be seen. Despite their initial language about discerning real events, we see no details here about what scene information is used. 2) It increases the potential value of a forgery because now your forgery is attested by Apple. So it either makes it easier to defraud people or more worthwhile to put in the effort to defraud people or both. None of those outcomes are great.
  - moffkalast 16d ago
    A sufficiently light absorbing material is indistinguishable from infinity to a lidar. Or simply add a mirror that redirects it sideways, those can't be detected either.
- gruez 16d ago
  So you need a big enough screen to cover the entire field of view at 16 ft? Sounds expensive
  - BugsJustFindMe 16d ago
    Well, first, that's only expensive if you're poor. The world is absolutely full of people who can easily piss away your entire annual income throwing a house party. But I really mean that if the lidar barely works outdoors anyway then actually you don't need to be 16 feet away at all. Anyway, one may presume that they've thought about this.
    - somethinsfishy 16d ago
      Put some sugar on it. Please.
      - BugsJustFindMe 16d ago
        Def Leppard, is that you?
    - brookst 16d ago
      Thought about it and also are bright enough not to fall for the “if a single person dies wearing a seat belt, we should abandon seat belts because they do no good at all” fallacy. It’s almost certainly possible to fool v1 of this system, for some images, in some contexts. It would be shocking if the first implementation was completely perfect. But maybe it’s better than nothing?
      - BugsJustFindMe 16d ago
        > But maybe it’s better than nothing? I think this will depend on how it gets used. I can imagine numerous outcomes where it's in fact worse than nothing (significantly more effective blackmail, for instance).
        15d ago
tristanj 16d ago
Apple's current implementation doesn't integrate LiDAR. And LiDAR wouldn't be enough here, it's trivial to block the projector and hide the dot pattern. No dot pattern = iPhone thinks the object is far away, which is what happens in landscape photos. A better fix is to take photos with all three iPhone cameras simultaneously, ideally as a 2-3s video, and use the parallax/multiple perspectives to extract depth information. The video files (Possibly audio too) could also be included with the verified image as additional verification. They can also prevent photos if iPhone detects the LiDAR sensor is covered, similar to how Meta does it with their camera glasses.
- halestock 16d ago
  This approach makes me wonder if the future is actually going to move towards visual cryptography.
  - alwillis 16d ago
    Um… that's already a thing [1]: TL;DR: What is C2PA in 60 seconds What: An open technical standard for embedding cryptographically signed provenance data inside digital media files. Who: Created by a coalition founded by Adobe, Arm, BBC, Intel, Microsoft, and Truepic in February 2021. How: A C2PA Manifest (also called a Content Credential) travels inside the file and records who made it, when, and what tools were used. Why: Deepfake incidents surged from 500,000 to 8 million cases between 2023 and 2025. Provenance gives media a verifiable chain of custody. [1]: https://c2paviewer.com/articles/what-is-c2pa https://c2paviewer.com/articles/what-is-c2pa
    - halestock 16d ago
      Hm, that's more like digitally signing an image. I'm thinking about something like e.g. encoding/encrypting depth information from multiple images to create a composite that can't be duplicated without the source images.
- pveierland 16d ago
  I don't think it's an either or - additional data signals that need to correlate to authenticate will increase confidence. You can use multiple other signals to evaluate whether something is truly a landscape photo, and in that case not require a LiDAR capture, but if you are inside and at close range then you could assume that it should be part of scoring the authentication. Similarly, LiDAR alone will help disqualify cases where someone is just taking a picture of e.g. a landscape target of the Golden Gate, but that it shown on a screen 1 meter away.

geokon 16d ago

furthermore, couldnt you do parallax from the multiple cameras as well as flicker the flash? seems pretty easy to make it sufficiently difficult to trick the system

BugsJustFindMe 16d ago

iPhone lidar only works up to like 16 feet in the easiest lighting conditions (indoors) and may be functionally ineffective outdoors.

pveierland 16d ago
Still, that means that either the fake target scene and your screen presenting it would need to be outside of LiDAR sensor bounds, or you'd need to find a way to make the depth sensor data conform with your fake scene, both increasing the difficulty of producing a forgery.
- BugsJustFindMe 16d ago
  https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49721878 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49721878 > increasing the difficulty of producing a forgery The problem with this thinking is twofold: 1) Whether it actually meaningfully increases the difficulty of a forgery remains to be seen. Despite their initial language about discerning real events, we see no details here about what scene information is used. 2) It increases the potential value of a forgery because now your forgery is attested by Apple. So it either makes it easier to defraud people or more worthwhile to put in the effort to defraud people or both. None of those outcomes are great.
- moffkalast 16d ago
  A sufficiently light absorbing material is indistinguishable from infinity to a lidar. Or simply add a mirror that redirects it sideways, those can't be detected either.
gruez 16d ago
So you need a big enough screen to cover the entire field of view at 16 ft? Sounds expensive
- BugsJustFindMe 16d ago
  Well, first, that's only expensive if you're poor. The world is absolutely full of people who can easily piss away your entire annual income throwing a house party. But I really mean that if the lidar barely works outdoors anyway then actually you don't need to be 16 feet away at all. Anyway, one may presume that they've thought about this.
  - somethinsfishy 16d ago
    Put some sugar on it. Please.
    - BugsJustFindMe 16d ago
      Def Leppard, is that you?
  - brookst 16d ago
    Thought about it and also are bright enough not to fall for the “if a single person dies wearing a seat belt, we should abandon seat belts because they do no good at all” fallacy. It’s almost certainly possible to fool v1 of this system, for some images, in some contexts. It would be shocking if the first implementation was completely perfect. But maybe it’s better than nothing?
    - BugsJustFindMe 16d ago
      > But maybe it’s better than nothing? I think this will depend on how it gets used. I can imagine numerous outcomes where it's in fact worse than nothing (significantly more effective blackmail, for instance).
      - 15d ago

tristanj 16d ago

Apple's current implementation doesn't integrate LiDAR. And LiDAR wouldn't be enough here, it's trivial to block the projector and hide the dot pattern. No dot pattern = iPhone thinks the object is far away, which is what happens in landscape photos. A better fix is to take photos with all three iPhone cameras simultaneously, ideally as a 2-3s video, and use the parallax/multiple perspectives to extract depth information. The video files (Possibly audio too) could also be included with the verified image as additional verification. They can also prevent photos if iPhone detects the LiDAR sensor is covered, similar to how Meta does it with their camera glasses.

halestock 16d ago
This approach makes me wonder if the future is actually going to move towards visual cryptography.
- alwillis 16d ago
  Um… that's already a thing [1]: TL;DR: What is C2PA in 60 seconds What: An open technical standard for embedding cryptographically signed provenance data inside digital media files. Who: Created by a coalition founded by Adobe, Arm, BBC, Intel, Microsoft, and Truepic in February 2021. How: A C2PA Manifest (also called a Content Credential) travels inside the file and records who made it, when, and what tools were used. Why: Deepfake incidents surged from 500,000 to 8 million cases between 2023 and 2025. Provenance gives media a verifiable chain of custody. [1]: https://c2paviewer.com/articles/what-is-c2pa https://c2paviewer.com/articles/what-is-c2pa
  - halestock 16d ago
    Hm, that's more like digitally signing an image. I'm thinking about something like e.g. encoding/encrypting depth information from multiple images to create a composite that can't be duplicated without the source images.
pveierland 16d ago
I don't think it's an either or - additional data signals that need to correlate to authenticate will increase confidence. You can use multiple other signals to evaluate whether something is truly a landscape photo, and in that case not require a LiDAR capture, but if you are inside and at close range then you could assume that it should be part of scoring the authentication. Similarly, LiDAR alone will help disqualify cases where someone is just taking a picture of e.g. a landscape target of the Golden Gate, but that it shown on a screen 1 meter away.