The fingerprint scanners on smartphones have come a long way, but only for select smartphones. Some brands like Huawei have worked to bring a lot more into the fingerprint scanner so that the functionality is not limited to just unlocking the screen. Here, we are talking about the Samsung Galaxy S8 and the use cases are a lot. Thankfully, you are not going to use it only for unlocking the screen.
Now that you have setup fingerprint scanner on the Galaxy S8, you can read on to know what all is possible with the fingerprint sensor of the phone. There are quite a few things possible, that is why you are asked whether to have it for unlocking the screen as some would choose to use not this but face or iris scanning for the same.
Screen Unlock
No prize for guessing this one. It is what a fingerprint scanner is mostly used for and that job is perfectly done here although the placement of the scanner is not so good from the company as it is beside the camera and many times, there are smudges on the camera area due to the confusion.
Samsung Pass
This is the authentication service where the Samsung Pass will use biometrics to give the users a secure access to the favorite apps and services, and the data is encrypted by Samsung Knox. In the Samsung Internet app, while browsing, you can use biometrics rather than enter the user ID and password.
Samsung Account
In the Samsung Account, you don’t have to separately login by using the ID and password because authenticating with the fingerprint is good enough.
Samsung Pay
Fingerprint can be used to make payments quickly and securely by the new Samsung Pay service, which is an excellent one that can be used at malls where the card machines support Samsung Pay. You just have to add your cards and when paying, activate Samsung Pay and take the phone closer to the POS machine and it will ask for your fingerprint on the phone to authenticate the transaction.
Open and close notification panel with fingerprint scanner
Not just with the security but if the fingerprint sensor is helpful with some regular interface functions, it makes the user experience better. With the Samsung Galaxy S8, you can do that by pulling down the notification panel or pulling it up with a simple swipe on the fingerprint scanner.
To activate that, go to Settings > Advanced features and here, the fourth option is about the “Finger sensor gestures”. Activate that and that will set it up for you. Now, from any active screen, you just need to swipe down on the scanner area with any finger even if it isn’t registered and that will pull down the notification panel. Swiping it up will pull the panel up.
Pretty easy to set it up and quite useful if you make a habit of it because you don’t have to reach to the status bar for pulling the panel down.
Of course, the fingerprint sensor can be used for several other authentications and it can work with other apps as well. But, the above-listed ones are what come by default in the device.
