1. A method of operating an electronic device, comprising: detecting a plurality of fingerprint drags if a finger is swiped on a portion of the electronic device, wherein each of the plurality of fingerprint drags is a consecutive drag from a previous drag and each of the plurality of fingerprint drags has a different orientation from each other while a finer orientation remains substantially unchanged during each drag; comparing a plurality of images corresponding to the plurality of fingerprint drags and a corresponding portion of a reference image; and identifying a fingerprint based on a result of the comparison between the plurality of images corresponding to the plurality of fingerprint drags and a corresponding portion of a reference image.