At the moment how the Apple Watch authenticates the wearer who is wearing the Apple Watch is through skin contact. This means that as long as the user has authenticated themselves previously, as long as the watch is touching their skin, but taking the watch off your wrist means having to reauthenticate again which can be a bit tedious.
However in a recently discovered patent filed by Apple by the folks at Patently Apple, it seems that Apple is exploring the idea of an Apple Watch that comes with Face ID. For those unfamiliar, Face ID is a new facial recognition security feature that is part of the iPhone X. It is expected that the feature will find its way into the iPad, so it wouldn’t be a stretch to think that it might eventually find its way into more Apple products, like the Apple Watch.
What makes this patent particularly interesting is that according to Patently Apple, they believe it might have been filed while Face ID was still being worked on because it refers to the feature as “user identification”, possibly to prevent Face ID from being leaked. It also was filed in 2016 which means that it isn’t some old patent just collecting dust.
However given that it is a patent, it’s hard to say if Apple will make it a reality. Patents are sometimes filed to protect intellectual property and ideas, so whether this is Apple simply protecting themselves or a hint at future features is anyone’s guess, but what do you guys think about Face ID for the Apple Watch? Yay or nay?
Filed in . Read more about Apple Watch, Face Id, Security, Smartwatch and Wearable Tech.