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Selfie Security?
Smile! Selfie passwords could be the wave of the future.
The average person has 27 distinct passwords, and it’s hard to keep track of them all. That’s why companies like Uber and MasterCard are trying a new kind of password you can’t forget: selfies. Advances in facial recognition software are what’s making selfie passwords possible. Here’s how they work: A company asks a user to snap a selfie, which it stores. Then every time a user makes a purchase, the app asks for another selfie for comparison. If the thousands of distinct traits in the photos match, the identity is verified. But the technology isn’t perfect; poor lighting can thwart the software, and hackers may find biometric data easier to manipulate than alphanumeric passwords, which are constantly updated. “There is nothing safer about” a selfie password, Marc Goodman, a security consultant, told The Wall Street Journal, “except it rules out the challenges of password management.”