Samsung Says It’s Fixing a Nasty Security Flaw

Samsung is planning a security update after researchers uncovered a vulnerability that could threaten as many as 600 million Galaxy phones. The company said in a statement Thursday that it will roll out an update in the coming days to address the issue, which makes phones vulnerable when downloading updates for the SwiftKey keyboard.

The vulnerability was discovered by the security company NowSecure last fall and made public this week. The SwiftKey keyboard searches for language pack updates over unencrypted lines, making it vulnerable to attack. In a statement, Samsung noted that the probability of a hacker actually exploiting the vulnerability was low.

Owners of the Galaxy S4 and more recent models will have the security update automatically pushed to their phones. To ensure your phone receives automatic updates, go to Settings > Lock Screen and Security > Other Security Settings > Security policy updates, and make sure the Automatic Updates option is activated. Users of older Galaxy models will have a firmware update made available to them that they can download.