Apple gets patent for in-screen Touch and Face ID

It is rumoured about the iPhone 14 that Apple plans to lose the notch next year, with in-screen Touch ID or Face ID two possible ways to get this. Today a patent granted describes how both forms of biometric authentication could be embedded into the display. It would be possible to embed the front-facing camera into the screen, this may be a later development…

Apple further explains that the current iPhone design has the imaging sensor beside the display, rather than part of it – the notch design does somewhat give the impression of it being part of the screen.

Typically, an imaging sensor is positioned below the protective cover, adjacent to the display stack. As such, a conventional electronic device incorporating both a display stack and an imaging sensor typically requires a large-area protective cover that extends beyond the periphery of the display stack in order to reserve space to accommodate the imaging sensor. This conventional construction undesirably increases the apparent size of a bezel region circumscribing the display, while also undesirably increasing the size and volume of the housing of the electronic device.

The main aim of the patent is embedding an image sensor into the display to read a fingerprint–embedded Touch ID.

For simplicity of description, many embodiments follow reference construction in which an electronic device implements through-display imaging to capture one or more images of a fingerprint of a user touching a specified region (an "imaging region," above an imaging aperture) of the display of the electronic device.

Moreover, Apple says that the same method can be followed for other forms of biometric identification, including Face ID.

As noted above, an electronic device can implement through-display imaging for any suitable imaging, sensing, data aggregation, or light capture purpose including, but not limited to […] face recognition.

Embedding Face ID and Touch ID into the display would help to keep everyone happy, and would also mean that Face ID could be embedded into Mac displays as well, negating the need for them to have a wider bezel or notch. Bloomberg recently suggested that Face ID will come to Macs within a couple of years.

Longer-term, the front-facing camera can also be embedded into the display. However, early attempts at this significantly degraded quality, including haze, low contrast, and inaccurate white balance. These issues will not be barriers to Face ID, so it's almost certain we'll see this step first. It's early days on the iPhone 14 front, and we issue our usual reminder that Apple patents all kinds of technology that it never brings to market.

Via Patently Apple