Facebook has
its own version of Apple’s Face ID. If you get locked out of your Facebook
account, the company is testing a way to regain access by using your face to
verify your identity. That could be especially useful if you’re somewhere that
you can’t receive two-factor authentication SMS, like on a plane or while
traveling abroad, or if you lose access to your email account.
Social media
researcher Devesh Logendran (a pseudonym) sent a screenshot of the feature to
TNW’s Matt Navarra. We asked Facebook about it and got this confirmation:
“We are
testing a new feature for people who want to quickly and easily verify account
ownership during the account recovery process. This optional feature is
available only on devices you’ve already used to log in. It is another step,
alongside two-factor authentication via SMS, that were taking to make sure account
owners can confirm their identity.”
If the
feature proves reliably helpful to users and isn’t fooled by hackers, Facebook
could potentially roll it out to more people.
Over the
years Facebook has tried a number of novel ways to help you get back into a
locked account. In some cases it asks you to identify photos of your friends to
prove you’re you. Or it’s tried allowing you to designate several “trusted
friends” who receive a code that you can ask them for to unlock your account.
While
Facebook has experienced some backlash to facial recognition for photo tag
suggestions in the past, this feature would only use the technology to
privately help you out. Therefore it shouldn’t engender as big of privacy
concerns, though obviously anything related to biometric data can give people
pause. But if it means you can get back to your messages and News Feed, or
repair damage done by a hacker, many people are likely to be comfortable to use
their face to Facebook.


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