A privacy screen is a screen that runs on the edge of an iPhone that blocks the user’s facial recognition system. With this screen, the system could potentially use facial recognition to scan for an iPhone, but the user can still use the device to unlock it and access all of the information it contains.
The privacy screen is so far experimental, but it seems that Apple’s team was able to break it down into a few key sections. First of all, the system doesn’t have to scan for an iPhone and instead uses the built-in accelerometer and flashlight to locate the phone. The system then uses its built-in face detection system to scan through the face of the user when it detects the face of the user.
And what a good face detector is, a face that isnt your face. This is something that Apple needs to be aware of and work on. The privacy screen is meant to only be used by the “approved” users in the first instance, but in actuality it can be used by anyone.
That’s a pretty huge privacy issue. We’ve all got a face, if you don’t know it you can just look at a picture of your face and it will be that face. People can be in the store and it’ll still be your face. There’s no guarantee about this and it’s definitely something Apple needs to be aware of.
Its a good thing that Apple has the “approved users” policy. Otherwise you will no longer be able to use the privacy screen for apps and other services (like FaceTime) that you actually want to use it for.
It definitely is something Apple is aware of. They have a policy that they enforce on all apps, including Apple Music and the new iPhone app called FaceTime. But the only thing Apple says when it comes to privacy is that they are not allowed to store the face data on the phone or even give you the option to delete it. The privacy screen is also an easy way for users to get notifications about privacy violations.
It is interesting that privacy violations are listed as a violation in the privacy screen, but not in the privacy policy. This is because Apple would have to go through the hassle of creating a new Privacy Policy and then a separate Privacy Policy for FaceTime, which would have been a hassle and likely would not be published.
Not to mention this is also a reason why you can’t just turn off the FaceTime “Privacy” feature. It is not hard to turn off FaceTime, but there are many things that you need to do to make it work as you’d like it to.
It’s a real shame that Apple didn’t just put the privacy feature as a ‘link in the privacy policy’ or something like that. Apple would have saved allot of work.
Apple has since added the privacy feature to FaceTime, but it hasn’t been as easy to turn off the Privacy Policy. You can still turn off FaceTime, but it takes time and the feature is not published anywhere.
