Technicians found information about the TrueDepth camera on macOS Big Sur, indicating that Apple is working hard to apply facial recognition technology to the Mac series of devices.
Technicians found a new extension on macOS Big Sur beta 3. Its code supports ‘PearlCamera’ that is the internal code name of Apple’s TrueDepth camera and facial recognition code. It was first disclosed in the iPhone X leak in 2017. iPhone X is also Apple’s first model equipped with Face ID technology.
Replacing fingerprints with Face ID Touch ID is a major technological innovation of iPhone X. Its security, convenience, and interesting Animoji inspired many people’s desire to change phones in 2017.
The front camera module of the iPhone X includes a large number of sensor units: infrared lens, floodlight sensor, proximity sensor, ambient light sensor, speaker, microphone, 7 million pixel camera, and dot projector.
Codes like ‘FaceDetect’ and ‘BioCapture’ found in macOS Big Sur beta 3 confirm that Apple is preparing for macOS to support Face ID because these codes are similar to those used by iOS.
The technicians investigated and found that this Face ID extension was obviously built specifically for macOS, not the residual code of other programs.
However, it will take some time to implement this technology, and it may take a while for Apple to release a new Mac model that should have a TrueDepth camera to support Face ID.
Another important aspect is the neural engine, which is part of the A series of processors, introduced to Apple’s equipment since the release of the A11 chip.
This neural technology is the foundation of Face ID technology that analyzes the details of the user’s face in a fraction of a second through a device learning model, but so far no Mac has a neural engine.
This year, with Mac’s transition from Intel processors to Apple Silicon chips, this situation will change, because Apple itself has confirmed that Mac computers equipped with Apple’s own SoC will have the same neural engine as the iPhone and iPad. This may be the main reason why Apple has not yet launched a Mac with Face ID.
(Via)
