How Samsung helps you understand your updates
Updating your devices is critical to the security of not only the smooth-running of your devices, but also ensuring your valuable business data is kept safe to guard against threats. Studies have found that nearly 60% of data breaches could have been prevented by better update management and systems that haven’t been updated are primarily responsible for cyber attack incidents. The impact of which is felt across three areas of business operations over three main areas, known as the 3 Ps: Protection, Performance, and Protocol.
Getting familiar with the 3 Ps of security updates
- Protection: Security updates address vulnerabilities against malware, ransomware, and phishing attacks - preventing unauthorized access to sensitive business information.
- Performance: Along with security, updates often bring stronger device stability and performance. Updates frequently benefit business operations, especially when done strategically: Reducing the likelihood of system compromise can enhance reliability, maintain uninterrupted access and reduce downtime and impact on business costs.
- Protocol: Many industries have strict cybersecurity and data protection regulations (e.g. GDPR, HIPAA), keeping devices updates ensures adherence to compliance standards and avoids fines or legal consequences.
Although it can appear tricky to understand what updates are necessary, and when to deploy them, it is often simply a case of staying informed and aware of developments. This article is here to help you understand devices updates and security better, making them simpler to implement.
What types of updates are there and what do they do?
Understanding the different types of software updates is important to effectively managing your device. To ensure that you have the latest updates for your Samsung devices, you can always visit our Security Scope Updates webpage, with the three types overviewed here:
- Security Maintenance Releases (SMRs): These updates take care of security patches and should be deployed as soon as they are available to minimize vulnerabilities.
- Maintenance Releases (MRs): These updates improve performance improvements and bug fixes. To identify any issues during the rollout of these updates, it is advised to deploy these in stages so if there are any issues, they can be resolved without affecting your entire fleet.
- Operating System Upgrades (OS Upgrades): These updates bring significant changes to device operation and overall user experience. These updates should also be stage tested before further deployment to ensure stability.
It is also useful to sometimes combine a SMR with a MR to streamline the update process. Using tools like Knox E-FOTA can help with smoother rollouts by giving you a better understanding of each individual update.
How can businesses keep track of and plan for new updates?
To stay informed about the latest security patches and updates, you can visit the Samsung Security Bulletin webpage. There you can see monthly vulnerability disclosures, including Samsung Vulnerability Enumerations (SVEs) and Common Vulnerability Enumerations (CVEs). You can also check the security update cadence for your devices to know how often they will receive crucial security updates.
For larger software updates, establishing the right update management cadence is essential to keep smooth-running devices with minimal downtime.
Additionally, knowing the support duration for your work devices can help you plan your asset management effectively. For example, Galaxy S24 and later models may support up to 7 years of security and software updates from the initial global launch, offering extended coverage beyond the typical work phone lifecycle. For detailed information on guaranteed updates, click on our devices listed as Android Enterprise Recommended.
How Samsung ensures you can achieve the three Ps of security updates?
Closely monitoring and checking your devices for available updates is a surefire way to meet the 3 Ps of devices security updates for businesses; protection, performance and protocol, and Samsung are here to provide support and information to help you get there.
At Samsung Knox, we help better ensure top-tier device security by continuously identifying and developing patches through our bug bounty program, rigorous testing, and collaboration with third-party OS and chipset partners. We build and quality-test the firmware, then work with mobile carriers to ensure seamless performance. Finally, we release the firmware for devices to download and install. Our strong partnerships with chipset vendors and carriers enable us to deliver consistent software updates globally across hundreds of device models.
For more information on our security commitment and how we protect your devices, visit samsungknox.com/security.
Stay tuned for a more in-depth article on setting up the right update management cadence to maintain device stability and productivity.
