NEC wants to replace fingerprints with earphones

Our fingerprints, faces, and even our eyes, are becoming an increasingly popular way to authenticate our access to devices and places, but NEC is working on a different biometric method that relies on earphones.

Low-Cost Touchscreen Feedback from NEC

It's not the futuristic electrostatic force field generation that can create different touch feelings over a touchscreen - like the one some expected to see used on the new iPad - but NEC was aiming for a far simpler and cheaper touchscren feedback method.

The key is a movable platform that allows the touchscreen to be slightly pulled in any directon, and I can really imagine it could be quite effective.

My only concern is that, being a mechanical system, wouldn't it be prone to higher failure rates, due to users pressing harder and harder to battle its movement?

Guess we'll have to wait a little while longer to find out... But I'm sure this is bound to become the next "big thing" after the high-resolution high-density tablet screens become commonplace.