"Chaos Computer Club: iPhone 5S finger-sniffer COMPROMISED"

[denverbill]

3. OK, assuming you have access to a persons finger, or fingerprints, and apparently a 3D printer.

I suppose if you are James Bond carrying about top-secret documents on your phone, you should be concerned about this.

My current (old) iPhone uses 4 digits for a password. It could be cracked by anyone with time on their hands.

The vast majority of people wanting to hack a phone are people who steal and/or find a phone, and 95% (or more) of those people wouldn't be able to crack it. Yes I suppose it's possible that maybe one in ten phones might have a good enough print to be lifted somewhere from the phone, if the finder was really careful handling the phone. Then if the finder happened to have read about CCC's technique, he'd still have to actually be able to replicate it, something which I doubt I could do, without a fair amount of practice anyway.

Personally, I think 'street grade' security is plenty good enough for the vast majority of people.