The United States Patent and Trademark Office on Thursday published an Apple patent application related to face and presence detection that could be used to help keep iOS devices secure. Patently Apple said the company’s application describes a technology that could allow a user to unlock his or her device by simply looking at it. Android 4.0 (Ice Cream Sandwich) already features face detection, but it can easily be tricked according to reports, and doesn’t always work. Apple’s solution details a way to analyze a user’s mouth, the tip of a nose and eyes, and the distances between each of those facial features to determine whether or not a person is is the owner of the iOS device. The reliance on 2D facial feature locations might mean Apple’s solution will be vulnerable to the same flaw that allows anyone to access a locked Android 4.0 device using a photo of a face, instead of a real face, but we won’t know if that’s a real issue until the technology is implemented. The patent also describes support for multiple users, though it is unclear when, if ever, Apple will implement this technology in its iOS platform.

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Facebook made tagging and sharing photos easier with its new face detection algorithm, a nifty little feature Facebook acquired when it purchased Divvyshot back in April. No more clicking on photos to select the faces of your friends as the new face detection feature will scan your uploaded photos and automatically select the faces in the photo. Once selected, Facebook will prompt you to tag the photo with the names of your friends.  Though it is somewhat rudimentary in its current form, Facebook promises that improvements are coming down the pipeline. Any Facebookers out there excited by the prospect of click-free photo tagging?

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Samsung doesn’t have much in the way of sneak peeks at CES, but we did manage to catch a glimpse of two international handsets. First is the Omnia Pro or Samsung B7610. The Omnia Pro doesn’t look too much like its cousin, the Omnia II, and it features a slide out QWERTY keyboard. It’s also a Windows 6.5 device that has a front-facing camera for video chat. Unfortunately, the only carrier in the U.S. that supports video chat of any kind is AT&T and it’s only one-way video chatting. We’re also looking at a 5 megapixel camera, 800MHz processor, Wi-Fi, A-GPS, push email support and a 3.5″ AMOLED WVGA display. Click on through for the Jet and for the rest of the flicks in our gallery.

Click on over to our Samsung Omnia Pro and Jet gallery!

The other touch screen phone from Samsung is the Samsung Jet. It’s smaller than the Omnia Pro and it bears a striking resemblance to the Omnia 2, yet the OS is different. Featuring a blazing fast 800MHz processor, Wi-Fi, one-finger zoom, DivX and XviD support, it’s also packed with a 5 megapixel camera, face and blink detection, MS Exchange ActiveSync, 3.1″ AMOLED display and a 3D user interface. Don’t get us wrong, it’s a pretty swanky phone, but honestly, it doesn’t really get us excited. If you’re looking to swipe one of these international devices, our pick would be the the Omnia Pro.

About 50 rungs further down the innovation ladder, some new Apple patent applications revealed this morning are definitely less interesting and complex than the few we covered last week. In fact, considering some of the technology has already existed for quite some time we’re not even sure why Apple is attempting to patent a few of these things. In any case however, it’s never a bad idea to stop and take a look at where the iPhone and iPhone OS may be headed in the future so let’s start at the top. The drawing above depicts an object identification interface that would allow the iPhone to recognize and deliver information about an object as a result of analyzing a photo/image or by scanning a bar code/RFID tag. Novel? Definitely not. Useful? Probably. Hit the jump for more.

This next patent application covers something Apple was very proud of as a recent addition to iPhoto ’09 — facial recognition. The difference here is that Apple envisions using the technology for controlling access and various handset functions which, if you ask us, doesn’t sound overly appealing or useful. In fact, we’d venture to say it’s less intuitive than other currently available options… Like typing a password.

Here we have a message filtering patent application that describes various methods for controlling and filtering different text-based communications:

Control application includes an instructional tool or study aid where the administrator sets one or more modes, such as language, vocabulary, grammar, spelling, punctuation and/or other content of a text-based communication based on, for example, a user’s age or grade level. This can be especially useful, for example, such as when a child’s grades go down. A parent can then institute a condition to improve a child’s grades. For example, the control application may require a user during specified time periods to send messages in a designated foreign language, to include certain designated vocabulary words, or to use proper designated spelling, designated grammar and designated punctuation and like designated language forms based on the user’s defined skill level and/or designated language skill rating. If the text-based communication fails to include the required language or format, the control application may alert the user and/or the administrator/parent of the absence of such text.

Well isn’t Apple conscientious?

Next up are a couple of patent applications pertaining to messaging that are designed to make things a bit easier and more efficient. Above is a group messaging feature that will check the delivery status of sent messages after a predetermined time interval and alert the sender when certain recipients have not read the message. Status reports, mmm. The differentiating factor here we suppose, is the interface.

Related to the patent above, Apple also filed an application for a process that would notify users of unread messages and emails or new voicemails from a specific contact before a new message is delivered to said contact. Not a bad idea.

Last but not least — actually it probably is least — the ability to change voice output. Fair enough…

Despite the restrictions involved in playing back audio files, users of media devices may wish to change the audio output of audio files. A mother, for example, might wish to change the narrator’s voice in a pre-recorded, commercially available audiobook to her own voice, so that her child can listen to the audiobook as narrated in the mother’s voice in her absence. In another scenario, a student listening to a lecture as a podcast file might want to change the audio of certain sections of the lecture to sound like someone else’s voice, so as to emphasize important parts of the lecture.

Sounds like more trouble than it’s worth if you ask us, but perhaps there’s more of a demand for Oprah’s voice reading steamy romance novels than we were aware of.

[Via Unwired View]

Read (object identification)
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Read (group messaging delivery status)
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Having long since been given the green light for sale in the US by the FCC, Sony Ericsson announced today that the unlocked W995a Walkman will go on sale July 6th at Sony Style locations across the US. Identical to the W995 Walkman in every way save for the inclusion of a tri-band UMTS/HSPA (850/1800/1900MHz) radio, the W995a is the type of device that we’d like to see SE continue to push out alongside smartphones like the Satio. Here’s why: a 2.6-inch QVGA display, 8.1 megapixel camera with auto focus, image stabilization and face detection, video calling, Wi-Fi, aGPS, FM radio with RDS, Media Go, Microsoft Exchange ActiveSync support and a 3.5mm headphone jack can all be yours, unlocked, for around $600. Pretty appealing, is it not?

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