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Thursday 28 sepTember 2017 TECHNOLOGY
A24

Q&A: How Apple’s Face ID facial recognition works

By The Associated Press rity, a string of letters and
In mid-September, Apple numbers — to protect your
unveiled its new Face ID privacy.
facial recognition system , DOES IT WORK?
which is due to debut with It didn’t during Apple’s
the iPhone X on Nov. 3. Sept. 12 event — at least
The system lets users unlock initially, when senior vice
their phones just by glanc- president Craig Federighi
ing at them, but has also tried and failed to dem-
raised privacy questions onstrate Face ID for the
and some anxieties over crowd before switching
whether someone could phones. Apple explained
force you to unlock your that handlers mistakenly set
phone by pointing it at your off Face ID attempts prior
face. to Federighi’s presentation,
On Wednesday, Apple of- which caused the phone to
fered some in-depth ex- revert to a passcode lock
planations about the pains before he took the stage.
it’s taking to protect your While Face ID won’t face
privacy in an update to its an acid test with ordinary
website. users until November, Ap-
Here’s what you need to ple says it should work just
know about how Face ID fine.
works and the precautions IS APPLE GOING TO STORE
Apple has taken for privacy MY FACE IN THE CLOUD? In this Tuesday, Sept. 12, 2017, file photo, Phil Schiller, Apple’s senior vice president of worldwide
and security. Relax, Apple says. Your marketing, announces features of the new iPhone X, including Face ID, at the Steve Jobs Theater
HOW DOES FACE ID WORK? face isn’t leaving your de- on the new Apple campus, in Cupertino, Calif.
Face ID captures both a vice. Associated Press
3-D and 2-D image of your The iPhone X will store rep- ciated with the enrolled So turning away is one OR GROW A BEARD? WILL
face using infrared light resentations of your face face,” the company said in emergency measure you MY PHONE STILL KNOW ME?
while you’re looking straight in its “secure enclave,” a its security white paper. could take. Apple says its algorithms
at the camera. Apple then hardware-based enclosure The only time your images Apple has also provided learn to adapt to appear-
compares that information designed to be resistant to can leave the phone is a panic button feature. Si- ance changes over time.
to images you took while spying and tampering. when you call Apple’s sup- multaneously squeeze the The system keeps recent
setting up Face ID; that The phone-based neural port service, AppleCare. iPhone X’s power button images and uses them to
comparison is done using a net processing means the If you’re having trouble with and either volume button allow unlocking if they are
“neural network” that lives image representations nev- Face ID, you can select for two seconds, and it will close enough to the regis-
on the iPhone X’s new A11 er have to go anywhere. which images you want to temporarily disable Face ID tered image.
chip. The iPhone X allows does send for diagnostics, the by turning the phone off. But if you undergo a sudden
Five unsuccessful attempts allow third-party apps to let company said. Just as with Touch ID, the changes in appearance —
at Face ID will force you to you sign in via Face ID, but CAN A BORDER GUARD/ phone requires a passcode like shaving a beard, for
enter a passcode — which these outside developers JEALOUS SPOUSE/TRAFFIC after a restart. The process instance — the phone will
you’ll need anyway just to only receive notifications COP UNLOCK MY PHONE BY essentially turns your phone only add the new image
set up facial recognition. from Apple that you’ve POINTING IT AT ME? into a brick for anyone who to its library if you follow a
That requires you to come been authenticated or not. Maybe — although Face ID doesn’t know your pass- failed Face ID attempt by
up with a secure string of Other apps “can’t access only works if you’re looking code. immediately entering your
digits — or, for extra secu- Face ID or the data asso- at it. SUPPOSE I SHAVE MY HEAD passcode.q

Need more room? Twitter

testing 280-character limit

By BARBARA ORTUTAY can convey about double users have found creative
AP Technology Writer the amount of information ways to get around the
NEW YORK (AP) — Need in one character as you restrictions, including tak-
more room to type those can in others. ing screenshots of blocks
deep thoughts? Twitter is The original 140-character of text and highlighting rel-
testing a 280-character lim- limit was created so tweets evant phrases.
it for tweets, doubling the would fit in a single text San Francisco-based Twit-
current length restriction message back when peo- ter said in a blog post Tues-
that’s been in place since ple used Twitter that way. day that 9 percent of all
the company’s founding 11 But most people now use tweets in English come up In this Wednesday, Nov. 6, 2013, file photo, the Twitter logo
years ago. Twitter through its mobile against the 140-character appears on an updated phone post on the floor of the New York
The test is being made app, where there isn’t the limit, compared with just 0.4 Stock Exchange.
available to a small subset same technical constraint. percent of tweets in Japa- Associated Press
of users and applies to lan- Twitter has already eased nese. “Also, in all markets, see more people Tweeting some users might have to-
guages other than Japa- the restrictions, and doesn’t when people don’t have — which is awesome!” the ward the 140 characters.
nese, Korean, and Chinese. count photos, videos, polls to cram their thoughts into blog post reads. But it said the new limit,
That’s because in those lan- and other things toward 140 characters and actual- Twitter acknowledged the while double the size, is “still
guages, Twitter notes, you the character limit. And ly have some to spare, we “emotional attachment” brief.”q