iPhone X Face ID Failures Spark A Peculiar Repair Strategy From Apple

There have been issues with Apple's facial recognition tech used on the iPhone X in the past, however, most of those concerns had to do with Face ID not being as secure as Apple had claimed with fancy masks being able to defeat the security. Over the weekend, a support document was unearthed that claims Apple is now making repairs to help users having issues with FaceID on the iPhone X.

The document outlines tests that employees should run on the device to see if issues with Face ID are related to a rear camera failure. The document instructs employees to run a diagnostic test to detect rear camera issues and if so replace the camera. If the tests find nothing with the camera, Apple workers are being instructed to give the iPhone X owner a new device.

It's hard to see how a rear camera failure could lead to issues with Face ID given its location. In the past, users have come forward linking failures of Face ID and the rear camera. One user noted on reddit not long after the iPhone X launched that the rear camera and Face ID stopped working at the same time and that certain camera features like pano, slow-mo, and time-lapse were still functioning but other features didn’t work. That same user saw a message each time they tried to use Face ID that said, "Face ID is not available, try again later."

That iPhone X owner said that a Genius Bar worker had told them that the cameras are connected. In that instance, the user claimed they were told that the telephoto rear camera function was connected to the True Depth sensor and wasn't working. It's an odd connection for certain, but there must be some "reason" behind these interwoven tech madness. With that said, given that the iPhone X is still well under a year old, getting a repair/replacement for a malfunctioning Face ID shouldn't be a problem for customers... for now.