Here are the security features in Samsung’s One UI 5.1 that increase privacy and data protection

This post is brought to you by Samsung.

“Your phone knows you better than you know yourself” is a phrase that might best describe our smartphones. Knowing or unknowing, we store a lot of private and sensitive information on them such as bank card details for mobile payment services, fingerprints for biometric authentication, passwords, and important documents to name a few.

And then, we grant access to apps and services to access these data. Some apps even have access to the camera, microphone, and GPS location of the device we carry around with us everywhere.

Therefore, to help you manage and protect your privacy and data, Samsung has cumulated every associated feature available on your Galaxy device into a single place on One UI 5.1 called Security and Privacy. Here are the security features in Samsung’s One UI 5.1 that increase privacy and data protection.

Review your Security and Privacy settings

You can review all your security and privacy settings in a single place under Security and Privacy which you can find in the phone settings. Here, you can view the lock screen settings, review your accounts, and check app security among under things.

Under Privacy, you can review apps that have access to sensitive data and hardware like camera, microphone, location, contacts, and phone to name a few. You can also click on a data or hardware to get a breakdown of all the apps that accessed it in the past 24 hours or 7 days.

Manage permissions for apps

In the permission manager, you can easily view and change each app’s permission to access your data and the hardware on your phone. The permissions are divided into three categories: Allowed all the time, Allowed only while in use, and Not allowed.

For example, if you don’t want an app to constantly know where you are, you can set the location access to Allowed only while in use. This grants the app access to your location only when you are actively using it and closing the app will revoke that access. This gives you more control over what information an app has access to and when the app has access to it.

If you require complete privacy, Samsung allows you to turn off the camera and microphone access entirely. This denies access to every app on the phone regardless of if they have been granted permission. Turning it back on will automatically restore access to all allowed apps.

Move files and apps to Secure Folder

Samsung’s Secure Folder runs independently from the main operating system and requires authentication to open. You can move apps and files that you want to keep secure into the Secure Folder which are then encrypted for added protection.

Say you have private photos in your gallery, but you have provided permission to social media apps to access it so you can upload and download media. Well, just move those private photos to the Secure Folder and they will be inaccessible to any 3rd party apps.

Besides files, you can even move apps to the Secure Folder and they will run in a secure environment. This is great for banking apps or any apps that you want to keep away from prying eyes.

Sensitive data is encrypted by Samsung Knox

Samsung Knox is a security system developed by Samsung that uses a combination of hardware and software-based solutions to safeguard your sensitive data like passwords, PINs, fingerprints, and face models.

Additionally, data from Samsung Pass, Secure Folder, Samsung Health, and Samsung Pay is also encrypted and stored in Samsung Knox for increased protection. Last but not least, Samsung Knox also defends your Galaxy device from malware.

Additional Privacy features

There are additional privacy features to prevent other people from snooping around your phone.

The first is Pin Windows, which lets you open an app and pin it to the screen, preventing the app from closing. This is great for those times when you lend someone your phone to use a specific app, but you don’t want them to exit the app and snoop around your phone. This feature can be enabled in Other Security settings.

Another privacy feature is Maintenance mode which can be used when sending your Galaxy device for service. Enabling Maintenance Mode will restart the phone into an operating system without all your files, data, accounts, and apps. Moreover, things like text messaging are disabled too.

Experience the safety and security provided by One UI 5.1 and Samsung Knox on the Samsung Galaxy S23 Ultra and its siblings, the Galaxy S23+ and Galaxy S23 today at the nearest Samsung Experience Store or Samsung Authorized Dealers.

Samsung is also offering double the storage amount for the Galaxy S23 series on the house until 4th June 2023:

• Galaxy S23 Ultra (1TB) – RM6,199 RM7,199
• Galaxy S23 Ultra (512GB) – RM5,699 RM6,199
• Galaxy S23+ (512GB) – RM4,699 RM5,199
• Galaxy S23 (256GB) – RM3,899 RM4,199

Every purchase also includes a pair of Galaxy Buds Live. Additionally, you can trade in selected smartphones to get up to RM600 instant rebates and receive up to 5x Reward points.

Head on over to samsung.com.my to grab the promo and find out more about the Samsung Galaxy S23 Series.