Password you can never change
Not with that attitude! You can absolutely change your face. its rather inadvisable
Comment on Stop Using Your Face or Thumb to Unlock Your Phone
Boozilla@lemmy.world 2 months ago
I’ve avoided willingly using biometrics so far. Though I’m sure our faces, gaits, body shapes, etc, are all stored somewhere, willingly or not.
Say no to biometrics. It’s like having a password you can never change.
chrash0@lemmy.world 2 months ago
it’s not a password; it’s closer to a username.
but realistically it’s not in my personal threat model to be ready to get tied down and forced to unlock my phone. everyone with windows on their house should know that security is mostly about how far an adversary is willing to go to try to steal from you.
personally, i like the natural daylight, and i’m not paranoid enough to brick up my windows just because it’s a potential ingress.
Boozilla@lemmy.world 2 months ago
It’s not a great analogy. Your house and its windows are exposed to your neighborhood/community. Your internet device is adjacent to every hacker on the web.
chrash0@lemmy.world 2 months ago
it’s an analogy that applies to me. tldr worrying about having my identity stolen via physical access to my phone isn’t part of my threat model. i live in a safe city, and i don’t have anything the police could find to incriminate me. everyone is going to have a different threat model. some people need to brick up their windows
Boozilla@lemmy.world 2 months ago
Assuming the phone’s security works as intended, what you’re saying is true. However, it’s a legit concern that the security is not airtight, and physical access is not actually required to harvest your biometric data.
I know the phone manufacturers make all sorts of claims about how secure biometric data is, but they have a profit motive to do so. I’m not being brick-up-my-windows paranoid by pointing out all the security failures and breaches we’ve seen over the years. Companies that have billions on the line are still frequently falling short at securing their own assets, much less their customer’s data.
I understand biometrics are convenient, and many folks love the ease / coolness factor of using them. Just don’t kid yourself that it’s secure by requiring your physical phone. Once the dark web has a digital copy of your biometric data, it’s compromised forever.
PoolloverNathan@programming.dev 2 months ago
That’s why I put Linux on my house.
tsonfeir@lemm.ee 2 months ago
Joke’s on them. My yo-yo diet keeps me safe from accurate body shape biometrics.
Thorny_Insight@lemm.ee 2 months ago
Same here. Still using the pattern lock. I’ve never used fingerprint not to even mention face scan.
ricecake@sh.itjust.works 2 months ago
So, it really depends on your personal threat model.
For background: the biometric data doesn’t leave the device, it uses an on-device recognition system to either unlock the device, or to gain access to a hardware security module that uses very strong cryptography for authentication.
Most people aren’t defending against an attacker who has access to them and their device at the same time, they’re defending against someone who has either the device or neither.
The hardware security module effectively eliminates the remote attacker when used with either biometric or PIN.
For the stolen or lost phone attack, biometric is slightly more secure, but it’s moot because of the pin existing for fallback.
The biggest security advantage the biometrics have to offer is that they’re very hard to forget, and very easy to use.
Ease of use means more people are likely to adopt the security features using that hardware security module provides, and that’s what’s really dialing up the security.
Passwords are most people’s biggest vulnerability.
Boozilla@lemmy.world 2 months ago
I’ve read all this before. If you believe the people who designed and implemented the device and its myriad layers of firmware and software were 1. All acting in good faith and 2. Knew WTF they were doing… then: yes, sure.
Unfortunately that’s way too many strangers for me. Hundreds of people design and code these things. Meanwhile, every week there’s a clever new breach somewhere.
ricecake@sh.itjust.works 2 months ago
While I do respect that viewpoint, there’s a lot more independent scrutiny of the hardware modules than there are around the parts that would handle any other authentication mechanism you might use.
Pixel phone example iPhone example
Just because something isn’t perfect doesn’t mean we should keep using the less good thing that it replaces.
Use the PIN if that’s more your cup of tea, just so long as you move away from passwords, since it’s the HSM that’s the protection, not the biometrics. Those are just to make it easier than passwords.
Boozilla@lemmy.world 2 months ago
You can change PINs and passwords, but you cannot change your biometric data.
It’s about as smart as using your SSN as your username.
lolcatnip@reddthat.com 2 months ago
If you’re that afraid if the people who build phones, why are you ok with using any device that can access the internet?
Boozilla@lemmy.world 2 months ago
I like how being cautious with my biometric data is beung framed as irrational fear and paranoia. As if ID theft never happens.