BMW has announced its Motorrad brand is now the first motorcycle manufacturer in the world to meet the challenge of bike theft with BMW iFace – a face recognition system that makes the previous ignition key superfluous and complements the existing Keyless Go technology.

BMW iFace was developed in cooperation with Professor Gerhard Lesjöh, head of the world’s leading institute for ophthalmology at the University of Munich. The system offers facial recognition of the rider’s face on the one hand and also an iris-cornea comparison of the eyes for definite identification on the other.

Face recognition uses the latest 3D technology integrated into the ultra-modern BMW Motorrad TFT display, which is not visible from the outside. This is carried out by means of stripe projection, a technology that has been used for many years for example in reverse engineering. With the helmet removed, the face is scanned three-dimensionally and biometrically.

This three-dimensional image is compared with a data record stored in the system. If the calibration is positive, the ignition, steering lock and other locking functions are released and the rider can start the motorcycle. Since the 3D scan works with infrared scanning, this type of face recognition also works in the dark.

The rider can be authenticated either using face recognition (without helmet) or by iris-cornea scanning of the eyes.

(Picture – BMW)