Users of Samsung Galaxy Note 10-5G complain that the August 1 security update is taking hold. I know, I’m one of them.
Most readers know that I have a love and hateful quote with Samsung. I love the supreme Android smartphone when things are going well, but, wow, it can suck when things go wrong. One of my specific concerns, as a security person, is the fractured Android ecosystem and the effect this can have on the distribution of monthly security updates. Lately, Samsung has been quite successful in spreading them to the fullest of users around the beginning of each month, and infrequently even at the end of last month. This month it turns out something’s wrong. Let me explain.
The August firmware update came with me today, Saturday, August 8, for my Samsung Galaxy Note 10-5G. As always, I promptly pressed the Install Now button and kept painting while my smartphone was anything that had been neutralized this month. Or, at least, that was the theory. When I looked at my phone after a few minutes, instead of the same previous update process, I received an error message: “Failed software update – Failed firmware update. Visit a Samsung service center.
I repeated the procedure and got the same result time, with the security update download OK but failing at exactly 26% during installation.
A quick Google search revealed that some terminal illnesses had not reached my Note 10-5G, but that others were experiencing the same problem. Samsung EU network forums, for example, come with several users complaining about the same thing.
Then I jumped to Twitter where, I wonder, I wonder, more reports about the same problem. The non-unusual link turns out to be the Galaxy Note 10-5G. This is not the kind of Samsung delight I’m looking for when I bought the high-end finish of the flagship 2019 range. And that’s also not good news for anyone who cares about protecting their device.
I am waiting for news from Samsung media managers, whom I have contacted to comment, and from the Samsung UK twitter account, to whom I have sent a direct message asking about this topic. When I hear one or the other, of course I’ll update this story.
In the meantime, if you also revel in this problem, let me know on Twitter. It turns out that this only affects Note 10-5G users at this time, but I’d like to know if other phone users can’t install the security update either.
August 10 Update: Samsung is reluctant to officially comment on the scenario related to this August 1 security update, obviously damaged, despite my insistence on an official response. Users of Samsung Note 10-5G, on the other hand, were very eloquent and contacted me en masse.
A reader sent an email to say that after contacting Samsung about the challenge, they told him to “update the phone from the PC edition of Smart Switch” or to return the phone to Samsung for repair. Another reader tweeted that other people who followed Smart Switch’s recommendation ended up with a brick phone. I have no first-hand evidence on this, but since I’m 100 percent sure that the challenge lies in the August 1 update itself, which with my Note 10-5G, this is not a direction I’ll take.
The overwhelming feeling of the users who contacted me is that of Samsung’s disappointment. Most have been unwavering with the diversity of the galaxy for many years. Everything splashed on what the high-end and much-loved phone last year. I’m not the only one wondering if it’s time to transfer to Google and Pixel with their guaranteed fast security updates, or even to the iPhone for that matter.
And now it would seem, despite Samsung’s radio silence, that the company knows that the challenge comes from the update itself. Why do I say that? Well, when I tried to download again this morning to see if anything had changed, I reported that I already had the last security update, dated July 1. In other words, Samsung withdrew the August 1 update.
I’ll update this article if I hear more. I hope it is to tell you that the challenge has been resolved and that a security update will now have to be installed to protect them from the threats for which it was designed. Look at this space, as they say.
August 10 Update (2): This is the closest thing to an official I’ve ever had, from the Samsung UK team on Twitter, via DM, after advising me to use a PC and the Smart Switch app to perform the update I already had. been removed at this point. After informing Samsung that Samsung had removed the update, and I agree that it now looks like a Monty Python comic strip, I was told:
“This would possibly imply that this is a step forward through our developers and will be released again soon, please keep your automatic updates to get it as soon as it is released.”
Just to clarify, I think that through “enhanced”, Samsung means repaired.
I have been a generation journalist for 3 decades and have been editor-in-chief of PC Pro mag since the first factor in 1994. Three-time BT winner
I have been a generation journalist for 3 decades and have been editor-in-chief of PC Pro mag since the first factor in 1994. Three-time winner of the BT Security Journalist of the Year Award (2006, 2008, 2010) also fortunate enough to be named BT’s Tech Journalist of the Year in 1996 for a future feature in PC Pro called “Internet Threats”. In 2011, I won the Enigma Award for my lifelong contribution to computer security journalism. Contact me with confidence [email protected] if you have a story to reveal or a search to share.