Today the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office officially published a series of 65 newly granted patents for Apple Inc. In this particular report we briefly cover two patents. The first Apple patent relates to Digital ID for Apple Wallet for a user's Driver's license+ and the second relates to sidewall displays on an iPhone that could be the foundation for haptic buttons coming to a future iPhone.  And as always, we wrap up this week's granted patent report with our traditional listing of the remaining granted patents that were issued to Apple this week.

Digital Identification Credential User Interfaces

In September 2020 Patently Apple posted an IP report titled "Apple Patent Reveals a Developing Security ID System tied to a National Database to assist Brick and Mortar Merchants & more." It was the beginning of Apple's move toward a national ID and driver's license app for Apple Wallet. In April 2021 Apple received their first granted patent for this project on a different technological aspect prior to Apple making this project public at WWDC-2021.

In December 2022 Patently Apple posted a report titled "A new Digital ID patent from Apple has come to light adding a new 'Liveliness Check' procedure plus adding 'Touch ID' to Credentials." Today, Apple was granted this patent.   

Apple's granted patent covers "A Method" that comprises: at a computer system that is in communication with a display generation component and one or more input devices: detecting, via the one or more input devices, one or more user inputs corresponding to a request to add a digital identification credential to the computer system; subsequent to detecting the one or more user inputs: displaying, via the display generation component, a liveness check user interface including one or more directions for a user to provide liveness check information; receiving, via the one or more input devices, liveness check information; displaying, via the display generation component, an identity check user interface including one or more directions for a user to provide identity check information; and receiving, via the one or more input devices, identity check information; and subsequent to receiving the liveness check information and the identity check information: in accordance with a determination that the liveness check information satisfies a set of liveness check criteria and that the identity check information satisfies a set of identity check criteria: adding the digital identification credential to the computer system; and in accordance with a determination that the liveness check information does not satisfy the set of liveness check criteria and/or that the identity check information does not satisfy the set of identity check criteria: forgoing adding the digital identification credential to the computer system.

In Apple's patent FIGS. 10i and 10J below we see that Touch ID could be added nationally as a second biometric credential. For payments or international flights, dual biometrics may be required. In other applications, user's will have the choice to choose their preferred biometric credential, Face or Touch ID.

See our December 2022 patent for more images or review today's granted patent 11663309.

Sidewall Displays for Apple Devices

We first discovered Apple's original patent application regarding sidewall displays way back in August 2014. This is Apple's nineth granted patent that continues to tweak to this invention.  

Apple's patent relates to electronic devices that may contain flexible displays that are bent to form displays on multiple surfaces of the devices. Bent flexible displays may be bent to form front side displays and edge displays. Edge displays may be separated from front side displays or from other edge displays using patterned housing members, printed or painted masks, or by selectively activating and inactivating display pixels associated with the flexible display.

Edge displays may alternately function as virtual buttons, virtual switches, or informational displays that are supplemental to front side displays. Virtual buttons may include transparent button members, lenses, haptic feedback components, audio feedback components, or other components for providing feedback to a user when virtual buttons are activated.

Technically, this patent could support the recent rumors of new haptic buttons for a future iPhone. Ming-Chi Kuo reported in April that Apple's iPhone 15 "solid-state buttons" had been abandoned. Mark Gurman had reported that the project was still alive and could be coming to a future iPhone. 

This is likely why Apple has kept the patent alive and active for the last nine years. The invention could also apply to a future iPad or other devices.

Apple's patent FIG. 1 below is a perspective view of an illustrative electronic device with a flexible display having portions on multiple surfaces of a device; FIGS. 15 and 16 illustrates side views of a portion of an illustrative edge-display that includes virtual buttons for selecting software applications and more.

To review the finer details, check out Apple's granted patent 11662869.

Today’s Remaining Granted Patents