Samsung Galaxy S8 Facial Recognition Is Tricked By A Selfie

The facial recognition security feature on Samsung’s upcoming Galaxy S8 smartphones might not be as secure as you think, after reviewers found that it can be fooled by a photo.

The feature allows users to unlock the phone simply by looking into the front-facing camera, but blogger Marcianophone managed to trick the system by using a selfie that was saved on another device.

Although there is still time for the facial recognition to be improved, the ease with which it was tricked suggests that it’s probably not as secure as Samsung would have hoped.

Selfie security

Samsung has since noted that the face-scanning option on the Galaxy S8 isn’t intended to be the most secure means of authentication on the devices and should be viewed more as a convenience rather than a primary security feature.

Speaking to Business Insider, a Samsung spokesperson said: “Facial recognition is a convenient action to open your phone – similar to the ‘swipe to unlock’ action. We offer the highest level of biometric authentication – fingerprint and iris – to lock your phone and authenticate access to Samsung Pay or Secure Folder.”

Samsung has previously described the iris and face scanning features on the Galaxy S8 as providing “the perfect combination of security and convenience” and this news will undoubtedly be a blow for the company as it tries to regain consumer trust following last year’s exploding Note 7 disaster.

Samsung has since vowed to “learn every lesson possible” from the Note 7 episode and even has plans to refurbish and resell the devices depending on approval from regulatory authorities and local carriers.

Apart from this new issue, the Galaxy S8 has received positive initial reviews, with our very own Roland Moore-Colyer describing it as possibly being “the best Android handset ever, and a smartphone that will really force Apple to bring out its big guns with the iPhone 8.”

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