Samsung releases critical update for millions of Galaxy users

It’s been a frustratingly bad month for millions of Samsung Galaxy users in terms of security – and to make matters worse, Apple has just shown these Samsung users just how far off the iPhone still is…

Samsung is certainly the most Apple-like OEM in the Android ecosystem, as this week’s “Stay in Control of Your Security” blog post showed. “Your security and privacy are more important than ever,” the company said, “so it’s right that our users have full control over their devices.”

The good news is that Samsung has now expanded the “exclusive club” of Galaxy devices that received this month’s critical security update, with at least some S21 and S20 models being the latest flagships to join the club of newer S24, S23 models and S22. It’s been just over a week since SamMobile warned that the “May 2024 security patch is available for very few Galaxy smartphones.”

The situation is improving, but it is the end of the month and it is not a good outlook for security.

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First of all, the seeming randomness is frustrating. If you’re looking for the perfect illustration, look no further than the brand new carrier-unlocked Samsung S23 phones that have started receiving updates — days after the carrierblocked versions of the same device received their own. And let’s not focus on the fact that this is happening in the USA, where Europe and Asia are also treated differently.

All in all, it hasn’t been a good week for millions of Samsung Galaxy users when it comes to “staying in control of your security.” The monthly circus around which device would receive which security update on which day was a mess. To achieve this, Apple came along to show how it should be done by updating everyone at the same time – ignoring the awkward mystery of the returning photo, of course. Ironically, Samsung likes to make fun of these kinds of Apple problems.

This mosaic of devices, regions and networks is disturbing enough every month, but this time it has become more serious because the May update includes a critical fix that Google included in April’s Android patch pack, but which was not included in Samsung’s patch pack to release this month.

The delayed patch affects Qualcomm modems and, if exploited, could result in a memory corruption vulnerability. There is another critical patch that patches a bug in the device’s phone changelog, and if not patched, it risked “local privilege escalation without requiring additional execution privileges.”

As I reported earlier this month, Samsung started May off strong, beating out Google in listing dozens of security patches. We have clearly regressed since then.

This week’s Samsung security blog post summarized the company’s security and privacy dashboard, the FindMy network that has become a buzz throughout the Android ecosystem in recent weeks, and, perhaps most importantly, the control center for the company’s “hybrid AI” features. This is a middle ground between Apple’s expected device-only approach and Google’s mostly cloud-based approach.

“Samsung is focused on enhancing the device experience with dedicated AI features while taking privacy seriously in the AI ​​era,” the company assured new and old Galaxy users who are now boarding the runaway Galaxy AI train. “Many Galaxy AI features leverage on-device processing, which means sensitive information stays with you. For functions that require processing in the cloud or on external servers, we make sure your data is protected with strict policies.

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Samsung admitted that “in the world of AI-enhanced experiences, we know that not everyone wants to use cloud-based AI. For some, storing data on a device is a priority. So while innovation is important to us, we believe it will be the same if not more It’s important that we continue to empower our users to choose their own experience.” Advanced Intelligence controls are designed to do just that.

Apple will release detailed plans for OpenAI/Google/Apple AI next month, putting an end to the constant speculation about what it will release – at least for now. When iOS 18 brings all this to hundreds of millions of AI-enabled iPhones, Apple and Samsung will fight for supremacy in the premium segment. Security and privacy are expected to play a leading role in this battle.

In the meantime, protecting all of these phones from the evolving malware that plagues Android devices – at least until some new features in Android 15 hopefully reduce the threat – is crucial. In this context, Samsung must quickly provide greater clarity, transparency and certainty.