How to Lock Apps on Android Marshmallow Using Fingerprint Scanner

Smartphones have become an integrated part of our lifestyle and there is no denying it. They have become too important that I don’t remember the last time I have not carried a mobile device with me. The growing portability and usability of the smartphones are helping it secure an important place in our daily chores. It’s become a habit that we store some important data in our smartphones or the cloud to quickly access it from anywhere. However, comfort comes with security vulnerabilities and, in this case, it is the possible data theft or misuse.

If you’re not alert and secure your confidential data, the aftermath would be useless as the damage would already have occurred. Preventing data theft/misuse is quite important in these days as we have made everything digital these days. So, I would suggest you explore various options to strengthen the security on your Android smartphones to prevent data theft. Luckily, manufacturers are including various advanced fingerprint sensors these days which will help you lock your device with biometric fingerprints. However, these devices only support native screen unlock with fingerprints or taking a photo but doesn’t add much functionality. Today we will see how to lock the apps on your Android device using fingerprint sensor. This functionality can be added to your device in the form of an app called “AppLock -Fingerprint.”
Applock Fingerprint is a new app in the Google Play Store that uses the Marshmallow fingerprint API to lock apps using the fingerprint sensor. So, if you have an Android device running on Android Marshmallow and sports a fingerprint scanner, then you can use this app. So, let’s see how to setup this app and use it to lock apps on your Android device using Fingerprint scanner.

How to Setup Applock – Fingerprint

After you install the app from the Google Play Store, it will ask you to grant the required permission from the Android settings. Marshmallow comes with granular app permissions, so you need to allow or deny individual permissions. The first permission is to draw itself over other apps, followed by usage access and device administrator. Since the app needs these permissions to work, make sure you grant all of them when prompted.

Once the initial setup is complete, you can choose the apps you wish to lock using the fingerprint sensor. As the app is using the APIs from Android Marshmallow, you don’t need to register the fingerprints again. One annoying thing is that the app has ADs which shows up at the bottom, so you might accidentally click them if the sensor is placed in the home button area such as in Samsung devices. You can purchase the pro version to remove the ADs.

Tip: When you set up the fingerprint scanner on your device, you can save up to five fingerprints. If you use the same fingerprints multiple times, i.e, storing duplicate fingerprints can improve the accuracy drastically.
So, download the app and let us know how it is to your liking.