14 DAY TRIAL // Samsung surely wants to get over the Galaxy Note 7 debacle from last year and make sure that faulty units don’t affect more users. It took months for the company to retrieve Galaxy Note 7 units after discontinuing the product, but some units still remain in the wild.
Almost 97% of all Galaxy Note 7 units sold in South Korea were retrieved, but 3% of customers are still holding on to their smartphones, despite the risk of units overheating and catching fire. Samsung warned about the device’s vulnerabilities in its report that marked the end of months of investigation.
As it turned out, the Galaxy Note 7 was plagued by battery defects, which caused the phone to overheat. There have been reports of Samsung intending to refurbish some Note 7 units by replacing their batteries and selling them in certain emerging markets, but Samsung’s division in India officially denied the rumor.
A software update will hit Note 7 units later this month
To make sure that Galaxy Note 7 units don’t cause any further damages, Samsung intends to roll out a software update later this month, to completely disable battery charging on the remaining Galaxy Note 7 units.
The update will force users to keep the phone plugged into the power outlet at all times, if they wish to continue using it. A similar update was released in the United States, and it did convince some users to return the phones, which are otherwise unusable without being connected to the power socket. In other markets, Samsung made the decision to shut off mobile network access to the Galaxy Note 7, with the help of local carriers.
It’s difficult to say if this method will convince those holding on to their Note 7 to finally return their devices, some units simply won’t make it back to Samsung. Moreover, users can simply choose not to update their units or use a power bank when they wish to take the device outside. Still, the units were recalled because of safety issues, so using them poses a risk to the owner and others.