On Thursday, Google officially unveiled the Pixel 7 series of smartphones, confirming all the rumors that had been floating around. But while it brought the expected specs, features, and pricing strategy, there were concerns about the Pixel 7 / 7 Pro’s face unlock experience and whether it would match the iPhone’s Face ID solution.
Now, Google has confirmed this. It’s clear that face unlocks on the Pixel 7 is inferior to Apple’s competitors, and even to the Pixel 4 from a few years ago.
The limitation of the Pixel 7 is that it doesn’t come with proper 3D face recognition – if that’s a problem for you, think twice before you buy.
The Face ID solution on the iPhone is said to be quite useful. Not only can it be used to unlock the phone, but it can also be used to quickly sign in to services and apps, and it is extremely difficult to bypass attacks.
On the other hand, the 2D face unlock feature on Android, despite being quite popular, has a serious security shortcoming – it can be easily spoofed by photos.
Even though the Pixel 7 / 7 Pro introduces a more advanced version of Face Unlock, it’s still not as inherently secure as Face ID.
That’s why Google only allows users to set up Face Unlock on the Pixel 7, and can’t use it for authentication on related services or apps.
It’s worth noting that Google has paired the Pixel 7’s front-facing camera with machine learning capabilities, but the company isn’t confident enough to open up the face unlock-based app login experience.
The benefit of this is that it completely eliminates attacks against face unlock to secure sensitive accounts such as internet banking, the downside is that the login experience isn’t as seamless as the iPhone. The experience based on the under-screen fingerprint recognition sensor, however, is still quite impressive.
Finally, Google has classified the Pixel 7’s face unlock feature as a “Class 1” biometric and confirmed to Android Police that it is limited to the phone unlock experience.
It’s not known when face unlock will arrive on the Pixel 6 Pro. But if you’re worried about hacking the feature, you can also choose to disable it right on your phone.
