Samsung Galaxy S8 Plus: New Security Update Improves Facial Recognition

Samsung launched a new update for its Galaxy S8 Plus smartphone in Europe, Thursday. The over-the-air software package includes Google’s monthly security update for April, which will have fixes for 49 common vulnerabilities and exposures for Android and 16 specific to Galaxy devices.

SamMobile obtained a copy of the changelog, which was in Dutch. The update is expected to be distributed in stages globally and has already rolled out in Belgium and Germany. In case, you were lucky enough to get your hands on a Galaxy, we would suggest that you navigate to the Settings section and check for the update in the Software Update subhead.

Read: Facial Recognition For Payments Could Be Included On Samsung Galaxy S8

The report further adds that the software update would also be improving the facial recognition feature on the phone. While not much is known yet about the kind of the improvements the software update will bring, there is a chance that Samsung might be improving on the security-related feature.

Unlike its predecessors, the Samsung Galaxy S8 comes with a facial recognition feature, which works using an onboard iris scanner along with the device’s front camera. The feature has been facing a little flak ever since YouTuber MarcianoPhone demonstrated in a Twitter livestream that the facial recognition technology onboard the device can be easily fooled using a full-screen selfie.

He simply took his picture from on Samsung Galaxy S8 and used the photo on the device display to fool the other device into unlocking. This is dangerous for users as the technology is expected to be used to in combination with Samsung Pay to let them make mobile payments easily.

Read: Galaxy S8 Facial Recognition Security Lock Can Be Fooled Using A Photo

The company was therefore, expected to launch an update to resolve this and this, probably could be the impending update.