Intelligent Scan for Galaxy S9/Note 9

Multi‑modal authentication system that combines iris scanning and face recognition with liveness verification and image preprocessing.

Overview

Intelligent Scan is Samsung’s multi‑modal authentication solution that debuted on the Galaxy S9 and Note 9. The system fuses iris scanning and face recognition to provide a convenient yet secure unlocking mechanism. I contributed to designing the software architecture and developing key algorithms, including multi‑modal liveness detection and landmark alignment, to ensure that the system could operate reliably under varying lighting and imaging conditions.

Contributions

August 2017 – June 2018

  • System architecture: Helped design the Intelligent Scan software stack, integrating iris and face recognition modules with a unified decision engine.

  • Multi‑modal liveness detection: Developed algorithms that analyse both infrared (iris) and RGB (face) images to distinguish between live users and spoof attempts such as photos or masks.

  • Landmark alignment: Built a landmark alignment algorithm to synchronise images with different fields of view, resolutions and spectra, reducing detection latency.

  • Low‑light preprocessing and optimisation: Implemented image filtering techniques to enhance recognition in low‑light conditions and streamlined processing for faster authentication.

  • Hard sample mining: Researched strategies to mine hard samples and improve the robustness of deep learning models used in the system.

  • Liveness verification (US12014571B2) – Patent describing methods for selecting and applying liveness models based on analyses of different image channels to verify that a subject is alive.

  • Selective combined authentication (US11625473B2) – Provides techniques for combining multiple biometric modalities (such as iris and face) with dynamic weighting to achieve robust authentication.

  • Device and method with image matching (US11682232B2) – Covers algorithms for matching images from different sensors or spectra, supporting the landmark alignment and image synchronisation used in Intelligent Scan.

  • Device and method with image matching (US12062251B2) – Presents improved image‑matching techniques for mobile devices, including consideration of varying resolutions and lighting.

  • Image fusion (US11449971B2) – Describes methods to fuse images from different sensors for better recognition accuracy.

  • Liveness verification (US11023757B2) – Earlier patent on verifying liveness by analysing multiple images from different sensors.

These patents underpin the Intelligent Scan system by providing liveness‑detection, multi‑modal fusion and robust image‑matching techniques.

[1] https://news.samsung.com/global/in-depth-look-3-how-samsung-streamlined-the-galaxy-s9s-security-features

[2] https://news.samsung.com/global/video-hands-on-here-are-9-of-the-galaxy-s9s-most-exciting-features