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One day, we’re going to live in a future without passwords. But we’re not there yet, so until then, we’re using all kinds of ways to unlock our phones.
Facial Recognition
Front-facing cameras are ubiquitous on phones and tablets, so why wouldn’t your devices just end up learning what you look like?
Pros: Probably the laziest option.
Cons: Lighting is an issue sometimes. And it’s possible to fool a device with a really good cardboard cutout, photo, or goofy mask. Won’t help if you need someone else to use your device, since you can’t lend them your face. Won’t work on Halloween.
Iris Scanning
Iris scanning feels super sci-fi. Sadly, this technology isn’t in very many phones (and Samsung, who pioneered the feature, took it out of their phones). But we doubt that iris scanning will be gone for long. As the technology improves, maybe we’ll see more of it.
Pros: Can’t fake an iris. Unique.
Cons: Not widely used. Sensitive to light. Doesn’t like glasses.
PINs
Ah, the OG of phone protection. Personal identification numbers, which we sometimes absentmindedly call PIN numbers, are used with nearly every phone on the market, even when they give you the option of using another unlock method.
Pros: Simple. Reliable. You’ve probably had PINs memorized since your teens.
Cons: Easy to guess, if, like many people, you use a year as your PIN. Plus, we’ve managed to forget them, which is frustrating if you do so after years and years of using the same PIN. What gives, brain?
Swipe Patterns
Thank you, Android! Swipe patterns are an interesting way of unlocking a phone. For some people, it’s easier to remember a pattern than a number.
Pros: Hard to guess. Can’t be stored in a text file, so a potential thief will never find it in a badly protected directory.
Cons: Pain to tell someone how to unlock your phone for you. Hard to do in the cold or with wet hands.
Fingerprints
This seems so obvious in retrospect. Every bad spy film in the past 50 years has fingerprint scanning, so why did it take so long to put on our phones?
Pros: Unique. No one can guess or mimic your fingerprints easily, no matter what Mission Impossible tells us. Plus, if you need to get into your grandma’s phone to help her on a frequent basis, you can add your fingerprint to her phone too.
Cons: Next to impossible to do when fingers are even slightly damp.
