{"id":313629,"date":"2026-02-27T21:21:07","date_gmt":"2026-02-27T21:21:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/313629\/"},"modified":"2026-02-27T21:21:07","modified_gmt":"2026-02-27T21:21:07","slug":"shoulder-surfers-in-samsung-crosshairs-with-new-privacy-display-the-irish-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/313629\/","title":{"rendered":"\u2018Shoulder surfers\u2019 in Samsung crosshairs with new privacy display \u2013 The Irish Times"},"content":{"rendered":"

The end of the \u201cshoulder surfer\u201d could be nigh, with the launch of Samsung<\/a>\u2019s new phone that integrates a privacy screen into the display. <\/p>\n

The South Korean tech company\u2019s latest smartphone, the Galaxy 26 Ultra, includes new display technology that prevents the screen from being viewed from the side, protecting confidential information such as passwords, PINs and banking details. <\/p>\n

The feature, which is exclusive to Samsung\u2019s premium device, uses the screen\u2019s pixels to narrow the viewing angle of the phone, keeping the screen visible to the user while making it more difficult to see from side angles. <\/p>\n

That effect is currently achieved by installing a third-party privacy film on screens but, unlike the screen protectors, Samsung\u2019s technology can be switched on and off manually, set to automatically kick in for specific apps, or applied to only a portion of the screen, such as the push notification area. <\/p>\n

The feature was one of the few significant hardware changes Samsung unveiled this week with the S26. The new devices are more focused on greater integration of artificial intelligence<\/a> (AI), even as consumers continue to struggle to find compelling uses for the technology. <\/p>\n

FDM CCS Insights\u2019 Ben Wood highlighted the privacy display as the Ultra\u2019s standout feature<\/p>\n

\u201cAs a mature category, the year-on-year updates are largely incremental, making it hard to stand out from the crowd,\u201d he said. \u201cThe privacy display is an extremely compelling feature that is simple to demonstrate and offers consumer benefits that are easy to understand. <\/p>\n

\u201cI think that without this capability, the Galaxy S26 Ultra would have been a tough sell.\u201d<\/p>\n

The new phones, which include the S26, S26+ and S26 Ultra, were announced at an event in San Francisco that also saw new Galaxy earbuds, the Buds 4 and Buds4 Pro, added to the line-up. <\/p>\n

Samsung is pitching the S26 range as agentic AI phones that will help cut back on digital clutter by showing users the most important notifications, summarising calls and voicemails, and nudging them with timely reminders of events they have been discussing in emails and messages. <\/p>\n

The AI features in the S26 line-up are expected to handle increasingly complex tasks for users in the background, nudging them to take action such as adding events to calendars and automatically finding photos mentioned in messages. <\/p>\n

It also gives users more options for AI out of the box, with Google Gemini, Perplexity and its own AI-enhanced digital assistant Bixby installed. <\/p>\n

\u201cSamsung is repositioning Galaxy AI as an orchestrator, not a single-assistant bet. Gemini stays core, but Perplexity, plus a refreshed Bixby, signals the best tool for the job \u2013 with the upside of fewer app hops and smarter handoffs, and the downside of fragmentation, messy defaults, multiple wake words, and tougher privacy questions,\u201d said PP Foresight\u2019s Paolo Pescatore. <\/p>\n

\u201cThe bigger issue is that AI still isn\u2019t a must-have for many users \u2013 a problem given that Samsung is leaning on Galaxy AI as its primary differentiator.\u201d<\/p>\n

EU users will also have to wait longer for some of the more advanced features, with Samsung holding back planned agentic AI additions due to European regulations. <\/p>\n

The Galaxy S26 Ultra also comes with a customised Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 5 Mobile Platform chip set, and upgraded thermal management to support faster AI. It also gets superfast charging that will charge the phone from empty to 75 per cent in 30 minutes, and a redesigned thermal management system that improves heat dissipation even when pushed to work harder. <\/p>\n

The S26 camera system has also been updated, with a wider camera aperture for clearer photos, enhanced night video capabilities that cut out noise, and an upgraded Super Steady mode that smooths out motion footage and makes it easier to capture video on the move.<\/p>\n

Prices have increased slightly for the phones, with the base model of the S26 costing \u20ac1,109, up from \u20ac969 for last year\u2019s comparable S25. The plus model will cost \u20ac1,289, compared with \u20ac1,159 last year, with the top-of-the-range Ultra model increasing marginally from \u20ac1,469 to \u20ac1,499. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The end of the \u201cshoulder surfer\u201d could be nigh, with the launch of Samsung\u2019s new phone that integrates…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":313630,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[16],"tags":[343,85,46,321,1523,125],"class_list":{"0":"post-313629","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-mobile","8":"tag-artificial-intelligence","9":"tag-il","10":"tag-israel","11":"tag-mobile","12":"tag-samsung","13":"tag-technology"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/313629","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=313629"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/313629\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/313630"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=313629"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=313629"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=313629"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}