The Genius and Tragedy of FaceID

Let’s face it…passwords cause problems. One Time Passwords (OTP) & Knowledge-Based Authentication (KBA) questions used for account recovery and authentication frustrate and annoy your customers. They also pose a security risk and can be easily defeated by bad actors. Password resets cost the typical enterprise $1M annually and are the root cause of 80% of security breaches costing businesses billions of dollars annually. To put it plainly, passwords, OTPs, and KBA are awful, creating friction, and providing poor levels of security.

Enter Apple FaceID, a facial recognition technology that launched on the iPhone X in 2017. Apple’s FaceID takes your existing passwords, payment cards, and other credentials linked to your accounts, encrypts these different forms of access and credentials, and allows you to manage these credentials through your device. The only action needed by a consumer is to present their face…genius.

However, FaceIDis tragically challenged by issues that it just cannot overcome. With FaceID, if you change devices and forget the password for an account, you are stuck with remembering the answers to secret questions or are forced to speak with a customer service agent to recover your account access. If you happen to leave your device at home, lose your device, or have your device stolen, the convenience of FaceID authentication is left behind with your device. Finally, with FaceID someone else can register their face to your phone and then use their face to login into your accounts. The login will be allowed because the authentication is entirely device-based.

At authID, our vision is to go beyond the device and power identity from the cloud. You cannot lose your biometric identity stored in the cloud. With Verified™, authID’s biometric multi-factor authentication service, if the same person tries to access your account with their face, the system won’t let them. If you don’t have your device, no worries – your biometrics are kept securely in the cloud and are there when you need them.

While it is exciting that the market has evolved from relying on physical documents to physical devices, at authID we are taking things a step further by linking an individual’s biometrics directly to their accounts. Instead of using facial matching as a front-end convenience feature for password retrieval, our solution creates a secure chain of trust linked to an individual’s verified identity. It is really linking your account to “you” not to your device or your document.

There is a growing demand for pay-by-face solutions in the market which represents the first step in the validation of our approach.  Eliminating the device and linking the account directly to the face. FaceID only lets the phone know it’s you. With authID, your face lets the world know it’s you.

But let’s be clear on one thing—we are not competing with Apple.  We actually support Apple with our FIDO2-powered AuthentifID product and enhance consumer experiences with Apple authenticators via our cloud-based Biometric Identity Recovery (BIR) product, making registration and management of accounts and devices a self-service process.

At authID, we are building a world using cloud computing and AI where your face isn’t just your password, it’s your credit card, your ID badge, your keycard, your concert ticket.

Let’s face it, our vision is to go beyond the device and power identity from the cloud. Connecting businesses directly with their customers, eliminating passwords, and creating new, innovative experiences in both the digital and physical world is our mission.

Schedule a Demo with authID  

authID.ai is a provider of an Identity as a Service (IDaaS) platform that delivers a suite of secure, mobile, biometric identity solutions, available to any vertical, anywhere. Digital banks can rely on authID’s FIDO2 passwordless authentication solutions for robust security and seamless customer experience. Contact authID today at 1 (516) 778-5639 or click here to schedule a demo.

Tripp Smith	Thomas Szoke
President & CTO	Chief Solutions Architect
A technologist and thought leader specializing in data, analytics, and AI. His experience is centered around strategy, sales, and building high-performance data science and engineering teams. Tripp served as CTO at Clarity Insights(now Accenture AI), leading teams for hyperscale technology and financial services companies, growing the company to $100MM+ ARR. Tripp previously held technology leadership roles at Hewlett Packard and the Advisory Board Company and is a graduate of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.	25 years of engineering, global sales, and operations management. President, CEO of ID Global Solutions Inc. COO, Innovation In Motion Inc., Inventor of IIM Global Corps HDR Intelligent Accessory product lines. 23 years with Motorola, Inc.