Apple wants to make it easier to share an electronic key

Apple wants to make it easier to share an electronic key as evidenced by a new patent filing for “User Interfaces for Sharing an Electronic Key.”

An electronic key (or eKey) is a digital or electronic version of a key that allows for secure, app-based access to various systems, including smart locks, real estate lockboxes, and online government services. 

About the patent filing

Electronic keys optionally provide access to physical locations, for example, by a wireless communication between the device storing the electronic key (for example, an iPhone) and an external device (say, an Apple Card) or app (Apple’s Wallet) that grants physical access to the physical location.

However, Apple says that some techniques for sharing an electronic key using electronic devices, “are generally cumbersome and inefficient.”For example, some existing techniques use a complex and time-consuming user interface, which may include multiple key presses or keystrokes. 

Apple says that existing techniques require more time than necessary, wasting user time and device energy. This latter consideration is particularly important in battery-operated devices.

Apple’s patent filing provides electronic devices with faster, more efficient methods and interfaces for sharing an electronic key. Additionally, such methods and interfaces provide improved security for an electronic key sharing process and how electronic devices share physical access rights when electronic keys are shared.

Summary of the patent filing

Here’s Apple’s abstract of the patent filing: “The present disclosure generally relates to user interfaces for sharing and/or re-sharing an electronic key that is provisioned onto an electronic wallet of a computer system.”

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