We’ve seen several rumours about Apple’s plan to remove its iconic home button from its upcoming iPhone 8. There are reports saying that Apple will remove its Touch ID fingerprint sensor completely, replacing it with face unlock, and it looks like this might be true. A developer recently went through the HomePod firmware, and discovered codes that points to an infrared face unlock feature. The code also confirms the front design of the iPhone 8.
According to developer Steve Troughton-Smith, the code in the first build of the upcoming HomePod’s firmware points to an infrared face unlock in the BiometricKit, the framework responsible for Touch ID. The code also suggests that face unlock will be able to detect partially blocked face, and faces from various angles.
As for the front design of the iPhone 8, Smith found a render buried in the HomePod firmware. From the render, we can see that the device does indeed have an edge-to-edge design sans home button, in-line with the previous rumours we’ve seen before.
The bezel-less iPhone image can be extracted from Payment_glyph_phone-D22.caar in PassKitUIFoundation.framework with the code pictured pic.twitter.com/HAyDO0E931
— Steve Troughton-Smith (@stroughtonsmith) July 31, 2017
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There are plenty of rumours regarding the upcoming iPhone 8, however, since this one comes right out of HomePod’s code, it is more reliable than the rest. Still, things could change, and until Apple officially announces the device, take these reports with a pinch of salt. For those of you who are technical enough, check out Smith’s Twitter to find out more about his discoveries in HomePod’s firmware.
Apple is rumoured to launch three iPhones this year – the iPhone 7s and iPhone 7s Plus with incremental updates from the current iPhone 7 and iPhone 7 Plus, as well as a 10th anniversary iPhone, believed to be the iPhone 8.
