Wednesday, July 23, 2014

Moto X can be unlocked using a "digital tattoo"

Did you ever find yourself getting bored with the traditional way of unlocking your smartphone, do you not want to swipe each time you want to open your phone? In a new video, Motorola introduces a new way that's both fast, convenient and secure to unlock your phone, and traditional it sure is not.

In a collaboration with VivaLink, they have produced a "tattoo" which is basically a very thin and durable sticker that you put on your hand. They claim for it to be able to last through swimming, showering, exercising and basically everything you can think of, and it's usable for about 3-5 days before you need to change it.

How does it work? It seems the Tattoo uses NFC technology, in the way that you touch the sticker with your Moto X's back, and that unlocks your phone, even if it is password protected. The unlock should be instantaneous, and you can simply wave your device over the sticker to make it unlock.

According to VivaLink, the sticker is very comfortable and you will barely notice it. While I can't confirm that as I hadn't tried it yet, in my opinion it looks strange and rather un-stylish in the way it looks in the video. 

Here's the full video of the tattoo's introduction:



As far as money goes, VivaLink is selling it on its website for $10 a pack, with each pack holding 10 stickers. Let's do some math now to see how much that costs overall- At a dollar a pop, the company says each sticker is durable for 3-5 days. Let's say 3.5, since companies usually over-estimate. So, with 365 days per year, that would be about 104 stickers per year. With a phone's average life span being 2 years, that means you'll spend a total of $208.57 if you want this technology for use during your smartphone's whole life time.

Of course, $10 will give you 2 months' worth of trials, which isn't too bad if you just want to try it out and perhaps show off a little... If that convinced you to make the purchase, then head right over here.

*Note: if it was unclear, this is only available for the Moto X

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