Samsung Patent Describes Touch Screen That Doubles as Fingerprint Sensor

While Apple pins faith on facial recognition to unlock secure iPhones, Samsung is going back to basics with fingerprint sensing but with a new twist. Samsung’s plan, as described in U.S. patent application 2017/0336906 published Thanksgiving Day at the Patent and Trademark Office, is to make a smartphone's touch screen of conventional appearance function also as a fingerprint sensor. Conventionally, the fingerprint sensor is separate from the main touch screen, because the sensor requires higher resolution for reliable recognition than touch sensing for screen control commands, said the application. Samsung’s solution is to make the touch screen capable of switching resolution, it said. A capacitance touch screen detects when a fingertip is placed on the screen surface and held in the same position for a second or two, it said. The screen then isolates an area around the touch position and performs a secondary scan of just that area with much higher resolution, it said. If the captured scan image of the fingertip matches a reference image that the rightful owner previously has stored, the phone unlocks and switches the screen back to normal touch control, it said. By reducing the screen area that needs to be scanned in high resolution, “speedy fingerprint recognition becomes possible,” it said. Samsung didn’t comment.