Apple Accused of Patent Infringement With Biometric Tech Feature

Apple Inc. was hit with a new lawsuit Monday alleging that iPhones, iPads, and Mac computers infringe a patent covering a system that uses face or fingerprint recognition to hide incoming message previews until the rightful recipient is identified.

St. Louis-based FaceToFace Biometrics Inc.’s US Patent No. 12,536,263 was issued in January 2026 but has a priority date of March 10, 2014, the company’s complaint said. Yet Apple has infringed that patent since at least 2017, when iOS 11 introduced biometric-controlled notification previews, FaceToFace told the US District Court for the Eastern District of Missouri.

The allegedly infringing feature allows …