(June 29, 2015) Fingerprint
sensor technology currently used in smartphones like the iPhone 6 produces a
two-dimensional image of a finger's surface, which can be spoofed fairly easily
with a printed image of the fingerprint. A newly developed ultrasonic sensor
eliminates that risk by imaging the ridges and valleys of the fingerprint's
surface, and the tissue beneath, in three dimensions.
"Using passwords for smartphones was a big security
problem, so we anticipated that a biometric solution was ahead," said
David A. Horsley, a professor of mechanical and aerospace engineering at the
University of California, Davis. He is a director of the Berkeley Sensor and
Actuator Center, which is located on the campuses of UC Davis and the
University of California, Berkeley and is co-directed by professor Bernhard
Boser at UC Berkeley.