Truly secure facial recognition is at least four years away, claim insiders

Industry sources predict that it will take more than four years for companies to be able to use facial recognition for mobile payments.

Humans are lazy creatures. We are always looking for an easy solution or shortcut. Currently, facial recognition is the easiest way to secure your smartphone. Not to say a fingerprint isn’t easy, but you still have to locate the sensor. Recently we got iris scanning from Samsung in the Galaxy S8, but even that isn’t as convenient because you have to place your eyes in a predetermined spot. Plus, people who wear eyeglasses often have to remove them in order to use the iris scanner.

However, due to the insecurity of facial recognition in its current state, many people still opt for one of the previous methods to secure their phone. Right now, fingerprints are commonly used in mobile banking, and iris scanning may become an option soon.

A source from Samsung told the Korea Herald, “In order for facial recognition to be solely used for financial transactions, it would take more than four years considering the current camera and deep learning technology levels.”

So we are a little ways off facial recognition being a reliable, consistent feature that can’t simply be fooled by a picture. But in four years we could have that luxury. I can see the headlines now: “Samsung angers fans by removing fingerprint sensor in favor of facial recognition.”

“We do not need to use facial recognition for mobile financial transactions because there are already high-level biometric technologies such as iris and fingerprint recognition. The question that when it will be used is meaningless,” a Samsung spokesperson said.

Read: What’s the best way to unlock your Galaxy S8?

By the sounds of it Samsung currently doesn’t have any plans to bolster facial recognition security. But industry experts still predict the extra convenience in facial recognition will prevail, forcing companies to invest in the feature.