Your Finger Must be “Alive” For Your iPhone5S to be Unlocked

Although probably not something that worries most of us , some people worry that there is an inherent flaw in the system of fingerprint authentication next iPhone 5S : a thief could cut your finger and use the accessory to unlock the device. Once inside, you can access third-party applications and potentially protected into one bank account .

After all , is not the first time something like this has happened . Years ago, a man lost a finger to a gang of car thieves in Malaysia who were trying to start their fingerprint safe Mercedes S Class sedan.

A second concern is that if the fingerprint validation becomes the industry standard , then once yours is stolen , there's nothing you can really do about it. At least with an access code , you can make a new one after it was committed , an option that clearly does not exist in some areas of the body.

Despite these concerns , Apple has informed users that their fingers are safe. Unlike traditional scanners that work alone optics, the iPhone 5S often use radio scanners to probe beneath the layer of dead skin that is on the outside . To summarize, the finger should be "alive" for the phone to be unlocked , a separate appendix or a plastic model requires not do the trick .

Sebastien Taveau , CTO fingerprint sensor supplier Validity Sensors , told Mashable, "The technology is built in such a way that the image has to be taken from a live finger . Nobody wants to talk about bio-metrics severed fingers and bodies , but at the end of the day we are to remove the fears of consumers and make sure they understand that a broken finger will not work " .

Of course , there are many other ways that a thief could break into an iPhone. The most obvious method would force someone to unlock the smartphone themselves , potentially using a firearm as an effective motivational tool .

Credit  TechSpot