New Apple Patent Hints At Big Touch ID Upgrade

Patent applications often mean companies have to expose some of their closely guarded secrets and Apple  is no exception. Now a new patent application from the famously secretive Cupertino company has shed light on a potentially exciting upgrade coming to the Touch ID home button used on iPhones and iPads.

Discovered by AppleInsider, patent application 13/918221 reveals work on a Touch ID button which would not only be able to read fingerprints but also interpret finger gestures.

 

Apple upgraded Touch ID patent images add gestures

Apple upgraded Touch ID patent images add gestures

The application’s verbose title is ‘Electronic Device Switchable to a User- Unlocked Mode Based Upon a Pattern of Input Motions and Related Methods’ and in it diagrams illustrate unlocks with twists, swipes and patterns.

Interestingly the application was made by Dale R. Setlak who is the co-founder of AuthenTec, the company Apple acquired which led to the development of the original Touch ID fingerprint sensors.

Obviously at this stage it is impossible to know if or when such an enhanced Touch ID button could come to market. That said it does show Apple is not happy to sit on a technology which is currently both a competitive differentiator and key driver of new services like Apple Pay.

 

Source: forbes.com