The Fingerprint Lock on Your Phone Isn’t Cop-Proof
By Kartikay Mehrotra
The FBI’s feud with Apple over access to Syed Farook’s iPhone might never have happened if the San Bernardino, Calif., shooter had been carrying a 5S or newer. For the 250 million phones sold around the world with fingerprint authentication since 2013, law enforcement may be able to compel suspects to press their fingers to the devices and unlock them.
With minimal litigation on the books in the U.S., police and prosecutors require only a judge’s blessing on a warrant for a suspect’s fingerprints. So far they’ve used the power sparingly. But as the number of fingerprint scanners in hip pockets grows, district attorneys across the country say the technology is poised to become a major engine of evidence-gathering....
Fingerprint-scanning phones will become the majority within about two years, estimates researcher IDC. As the pile of warrant requests grows, the pressure will be on magistrate judges to draw a line between genuine seizures and fishing expeditions, says Leslie Harris, a lecturer at the University of California at Berkeley’s School of Information. “They could be the last line of defense,” says Harris, who’s also president of the Harris Strategy Group, a think tank that advocates for privacy rights. “And they often get calls in the dead of night that force them to make immediate decisions. It’s not an ideal situation.”