Finally got my phone and did the test. Unfortunately, it worked as expected on my phone. So I guess it shall forever be a mystery. Maybe she has a flakey phone. Maybe her prints are close, but not close enough to be repeatable reliably. Maybe her and I are wrong and she did touch it. She doesn't care. So in the end, it really doesn't matter.
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TouchID accepting prints it shouldn't
- Thread starter MEJHarrison
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The 1 in 50,000 probability of finding matching fingerprints are mentioned in the Apple support page here. Yes, identical twins don't have identical fingerprints but they have the maximum similarity between fingerprints compared to non-twins.
I guess we won't find out if she's among the 1 in 50,000 as having identical fingerprints on one hand if she won't repeat the setup process.
Or she registered her thumb in the settings when you weren't looking anymore? It's possible to register fingers at any time you want.
She probably touched her thumb to it and you didn't see. I don't know why this is such a mystery to you... let it go
Okay, that claim is different. It's 1/50,000 that the small section touchid scans can be identical between two individuals. That I can believe -- my own finger prints all look fairly similar on a quick glance.
The chances of an entire finger print being identical to another even within the same person is pretty much nil.
Yes, that's what I meant as the likely explanation as to why TouchID might be recognizing the woman's unregistered print.
She DID enter her finger on my phone. We were unable to duplicate the results. I'm still going with the 1/50,000 thing. Regardless of what others may think, I know what I saw. I was hoping this would work. It didn't. Which doesn't prove anything one way or the other. Oh well. Time to move on I guess.
I'm not sure what happened here and am curious to find out.
But I can safely say that if there was a significant design flaw with TouchID, it would have been ALL over the media a long time ago. Bashing Apple has become its own sport, particularly with tech media, and when TouchID first came out, people fell over themselves to find fault with it. Some guys in Germany even came up with a highly convoluted way to circumvent it. And I'm pretty sure Samsung has spent time in their labs trying to find something wrong with it.
But the media has been quiet, and banks are promoting Apple Pay heavily, so I firmly believe that TouchID is a well-vetted technology. I trust it.
But I can safely say that if there was a significant design flaw with TouchID, it would have been ALL over the media a long time ago. Bashing Apple has become its own sport, particularly with tech media, and when TouchID first came out, people fell over themselves to find fault with it. Some guys in Germany even came up with a highly convoluted way to circumvent it. And I'm pretty sure Samsung has spent time in their labs trying to find something wrong with it.
But the media has been quiet, and banks are promoting Apple Pay heavily, so I firmly believe that TouchID is a well-vetted technology. I trust it.
Same here. But I'm out of ideas. I'm not doubting the quality of TouchID. If I thought that, I'd suspect hers was a faulty TouchID, not all of them in general. I honestly don't think she has a flaky TouchID. I fully believe the 1 in 50,000 theory, but there's no way to prove that one way or the other that I can think of. And she really doesn't care. After she sampled a small group of people and they couldn't unlock it, she was satisfied.
As curious as I am, I think this will remain a mystery.