Applications are finally beginning to make use of Android 6.0’s fingerprint authentication, letting users access sensitive information without having to enter (or unsafely store) complicated passwords on their phones.
State Farm is the latest to join in by adding fingerprint authorization to its Pocket Agent app. Bank of America and Chase Mobile had both enabled fingerprint support over the past two weeks.
While there are ways for attackers to beat fingerprint scanners such as taking the digital file that includes a fingerprint, they’re kind of complicated, and hackers would more than likely need to have physical possession of the device in order to do so.
On the downside, only certain devices support this feature. Right now, the feature is only available on Nexus phones and the LG G5. Those of you with Samsung phones or the HTC 10 will have to keep entering your passwords like normal, or considering using a password manager until Samsung and HTC implement the Android Fingerprint API.
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