Throughout the Samsung Developer Convention 2022 on Oct. 12, the corporate launched the brand new One UI 5, the evolution of SmartThings and the brand new Samsung Knox Matrix and expanded its well being and wellness ecosystem for the Galaxy Watch.
Samsung held its annual Developer Convention in San Francisco, bringing collectively builders, creators and designers. The corporate, like many others, was eager to emphasize its imaginative and prescient for smarter and extremely customized experiences which can be centered on the shopper.
Forward of SDC22, TechRepublic spoke to Seungwon Shin, vp and head of safety for Samsung’s Cell Expertise Division, throughout a pre-briefing to get the within story on the brand new bulletins and the challenges of constructing new safety and privateness options.
“Really, Samsung internally already had the applied sciences … . The difficulty actually for us was find out how to ship these applied sciences into options that buyers really feel comfy utilizing and find out how to safe the buyer units with out customers having to do all of the sophisticated configuration,” mentioned Shin.
What’s new in One UI 5?
Throughout SDC22 the corporate introduced the discharge of the brand new One UI 5. Samsung’s One UI Beta program was initially launched in August 2022. The corporate explains that the suggestions from hundreds of Galaxy customers who participated within the One UI Beta program formed the brand new One UI 5 expertise.
The One UI 5 supplies a brand new design that focuses on customized cell experiences. Icons are bolder and less complicated, notifications may be learn at a look, and the pop-up name show has been redesigned.
Among the many new options, Bixby Textual content Name permits customers to reply telephone calls just by typing a message. Samsung’s clever platform Bixby converts the textual content to audio and shares it straight with the caller on the road. The characteristic is designed for customers to take calls even in environments the place they cannot be heard, like a busy prepare or a loud live performance.
One other replace is Samsung’s Routine. The brand new answer permits customers to change to totally different smartphone modes, reminiscent of “morning routine, work routine or sleep routine.” With routines, customers can set off a sequence of actions on their gadget based mostly on their actions, creating with One UI 5’s modes personalized settings for various components of their life.
To arrange the Residence screens, customers can now use the brand new Stack widgets, which permit customers to tug and drop widgets on prime of one another and swipe left or proper to rapidly and simply scroll by means of every one. The brand new One UI 5 additionally comes with new Sensible ideas for widgets. Sensible ideas robotically counsel apps and actions based mostly on utilization patterns and the context of a consumer’s cell exercise. Different options embody good textual content extraction and picture extraction.
Shin explains that Samsung works in three principal areas to steer in safety and cell privateness: true end-to-end safety, knowledge separation for impartial work and private profiles, and runtime safety.
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Anchored within the {hardware}, Knox is the center of the Samsung Galaxy safety.
“Knox structure supplies a hardware-based safety system. Because of this though the attacker has compromised a number of the software program within the cell system, they can not seize the safe pockets or a number of the crucial data of the shopper as a result of it’s saved within the {hardware},” Shin defined.
Galaxy customers attempting out the beta model of One UI highlighted the brand new Safety Dashboard as one in every of their favorites. On this new dashboard, customers can management the privateness and the gadget’s safety settings and discover ideas or warnings.
The One UI 5 additionally incorporates a new notification on the Share Panel that warns a consumer in the event that they’re about to unwittingly share a photograph that accommodates probably delicate data reminiscent of a picture of a credit score or debit card, driver’s license, Social Safety card or passport.
Shin explains that with the brand new dashboard, customers can see and customise settings for the digicam, microphone and monitoring areas. Moreover, they’ll perceive what functions have used the digicam or microphone.
“So, if the shopper doesn’t like that type of monitoring, then he or she can simply flip off these options,” Shin mentioned. Furthermore, the corporate will present safety updates for at the very least 5 years for its prospects.
Samsung may also develop the Samsung Pockets to 13 new markets this yr, together with Denmark, Finland, Qatar, South Africa, Sweden, Switzerland and UAE. The pockets was initially launched in June 2022 to markets together with China, France, Germany, Italy, the U.Okay. and the U.S.
With the pockets, the corporate appears into the way forward for digital finance trending globally and positions itself to compete with prime wallets like these provided by Apple or Google. The pockets can retailer something from financial institution playing cards and digital keys to journey passes, driver’s licenses and pupil IDs. Like all of Samsung’s options, it’s protected by Samsung’s safety platform, Knox, which incorporates fingerprint recognition and encryption.
SmartThings and Calm Know-how
Samsung can be betting strongly on Web of Issues good residence units. With the brand new One UI 5, customers can management all units with their smartphones. The built-in SmartThings and Bixby platform is how the corporate desires to construct a user-friendly good residence expertise able to supporting a number of family units.
“As applied sciences grow to be extra complicated, we are going to at all times seek for methods to make life simpler, extra linked and extra versatile, so our shoppers can deal with what issues most,” mentioned Jong-Hee Han, vice chairman, CEO and head of the Gadget Expertise Division at Samsung Electronics.
The imaginative and prescient the corporate calls Calm Know-how saves customers time on a setup by immediately permitting clever units to work collectively. Samsung reimagined SmartThings and its linked companies and partnerships, together with Samsung’s Hub In every single place, extending its capabilities to the whole good residence.
Moreover, Samsung introduced an expanded partnership with Google to take good residence interoperability to the following degree. Within the coming months, Samsung Galaxy telephone and pill customers can onboard Matter-compatible units to each the SmartThings and Google Residence ecosystems. Customers can now keep away from working a number of apps and accounts to manage every gadget by connecting units between totally different ecosystems.
“In contrast to another distributors, we try to collaborate with a number of companions to ensure the safety of their cell experiences,” Shin mentioned.
Alternatively, with the brand new Bixby Residence Studio, builders can now construct differentiated, personalized experiences for the SmartThings platform.
“Today, all our units might be linked. On this surroundings, there shouldn’t be any type of potential menace. To deal with threats, we’ve got proposed the Knox Matrix,” Shin mentioned.
Knox Matrix: Blockchain IoT safety
As good units and IoT grow to be extra frequent, so do breaches. Cyberattacks prey on weak good units to entry a broader community. To supply cutting-edge safety options for this new surroundings Samsung introduced Knox Matrix, a personal blockchain-based platform that turns eligible Samsung units right into a defend to guard the consumer’s total gadget ecosystem.
Knox Matrix retains Galaxy units, TVs and different residence units safe whereas permitting customized privateness by means of the brand new Safety and Privateness dashboard. The system scans for vulnerabilities, recommends safety updates, and provides customers knowledge administration choices to maintain privateness and safety prime of thoughts.
“We’re going to arrange a trusted and safe channel on the Samsung units, which implies that our smartphone, our good TV or our good air air purifier—they’ll join with one another to observe one another and share details about the safety,” Shin added.
The corporate reckons Knox Matrix is a revolutionary idea for multi-device safety, a discipline they view as the following battlefront for safety and privateness. With Knox Matrix, when good units are linked and speaking with one another, not solely do they generate a layer of community units, however they’ll establish if a tool is breached and block and isolate it from the community. Knox Matrix helps units based mostly on Android, Tizen or different working programs.
“We began the design course of for Knox Matrix final yr. And we carried out our inside lab checks in addition to proof of idea, which confirmed the wants in addition to the probabilities of this know-how. So, right here at SDC, we’re introducing it for the primary time,” Shin defined.
When questioned in the event that they count on many updates and patches within the close to future, Shin added that Knox Matrix leverages plenty of the prevailing options of Knox.
“So, we don’t foresee too many updates, however we’re making preparations to use incremental updates going ahead,” Shin mentioned.
Well being tech: Wearables, medical analysis and highway security
Samsung additionally introduced new initiatives to proceed growing its well being companies and options. Throughout the convention, the corporate highlighted a brand new software programming interface that provides adjustable sensitivity for Fall Detection for the Galaxy Watch. Galaxy customers can regulate sensitivity ranges—standing nonetheless, shifting or exercising—by way of the Galaxy Wearable app.
SEE: Samsung unveils Galaxy Z Flip 4, Z Fold 4, Galaxy Watch 5 (TechRepublic)
Moreover, builders can now create companies utilizing Galaxy Watch’s Fall Detection algorithms that sense a consumer’s stumble or fall by combining totally different sensors, together with an accelerometer and gyroscope.
The corporate additionally introduced the Toolkit for Medical Analysis of Samsung, a brand new open-source healthcare know-how that helps medical analysis at hospitals, establishments, wellness facilities and different care organizations. The instrument is designed to speed up analysis processes and ship superior knowledge and insights by means of wearables just like the Galaxy Watch.
Researchers can use this open-source mission to construct modules that allow contributors to affix a examine, with the intention of streamlining the onboarding course of.
“Versatile survey templates are additionally in place to fulfill the ever-changing wants of organizations. From there, related knowledge and insights are gathered extra simply from wearable units, whereas contributors are guided with actionable insights all through the method,” the corporate defined.
Samsung Well being and Fitbit additionally adopted Well being Join. This platform supplies centralized privateness controls, making it simpler for customers to grant or deny permissions to well being and health apps. Well being Join additionally works within the health apps Leap Health, MyFitnessPal and Withings.
Lastly, with the Samsung Privileged Well being SDK, Samsung partnered with Tobii, an eye-tracking and a focus computing instrument, to make roads safer. The Privileged Well being SDK can establish early driver fatigue and stress indicators and decide the consumer’s degree of drowsiness whereas on the highway by sensing real-time coronary heart charge ranges by means of the Galaxy Watch.
From new alternatives for builders to healthcare, good residence units, safety improvements and their new pores and skin for Android, Samsung is pushing ahead on a broad entrance to make superior and complicated know-how obtainable to customers in a easy approach. It’s no straightforward feat to deliver the most recent in cell tech into everybody’s palms. It could appear seamless and easy, however behind it, the corporate has invested numerous hours in analysis and growth and continues to innovate.
