Apple is preparing to abolish passwords in favour of fingerprint recognition
An iWatch device is also rumoured to be in production
Remembering scores of passwords for everything from your smartphone to your bank account is one of the most tiresome tasks of the day.
But that may be about to change as technology companies battle to come up with alternative methods, including fingerprint, voice and facial recognition.
They see passwords as an outdated security risk as consumers often forget the increasingly complicated combinations and criminals break the codes.
Apple is among several companies preparing to abolish passwords in favour of fingerprint recognition.
It is said to be releasing a new iPhone that allows owners to identify themselves by pressing their finger on to the handset, rather than filling in passwords.
If successful, the technology could also be used to access bank accounts and email accounts and even act as an electronic payment card.
Its competitor Google, maker of the Android phones, is exploring the possibility of voice recognition, iris scanners, behavioural biometrics and heartbeat reading.
Research into passwords by Microsoft in 2007 suggested that the average person used 6.5 passwords for 25 sites. The number will have increased massively since the study.
Michael Barratt, head of security at PayPal is part of the Fido (fast identity online) Alliance, a group of companies whose motto is ‘forget passwords’.
He said: ‘Our reliance on passwords is making it easier for criminals and harder for consumers. We advise people to make their passwords as complex, numerous and as tough to crack as possible, but in doing so it makes them really difficult to remember.
‘It’s now a case of looking beyond passwords and the best alternatives are provided by smartphones.’
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Mr Barrett, whose firm handled £95billion of transactions last year, claims this year is the beginning of a new ‘experimentation phase’ for the next generation of smartphones.
He added: ‘The general view in our industry is that Apple will launch a fingerprint-enabled iPhone before the end of the year.
‘The Android handset market is extremely conscious of what Apple is doing and intends to stay competitive so it’s highly likely there will be fingerprint and voice identification-enabled devices from them too in the near future.’Apple has already bought a company which is a market leader in fingerprint identification technology. Shortly afterwards, it submitted a patent for a biometric sensor.
The company is expected to release the iPhone 5S this summer followed by the iPhone 6 later in the year.
An iWatch device is also rumoured to be in production.
A number of smartphones have already introduced voice recognition software and around a fifth have facial recognition capabilities, including the Samsung Galaxy S III which allows the user to unlock the phone by looking at it.
But critics point out that the rumoured methods may not work in certain situations.
They say that voice recognition may not work in a bar or otherwise with background noise and fingerprint technology may not always work.
Philip Hoyer, director of strategic solutions at HID Global which manufactures secure identity technology, said the only way round the problem was to combine methods.
‘If you’re trying to access your account in a noisy bar, instead of using voice recognition, you could switch to facial recognition using the phone’s video camera.’
Apple declined to comment.
