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Feature Request: Make a feature so we can hide Bluetooth devices and connections

(Topic created: 03-01-2023 10:25 PM)
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userUxtCVhBce7
Astronaut
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Galaxy Watch

Now, I probably know the answer to this, but I'll ask the stupid question anyway. My neighbours are probably the dullest knives on the planet. Just this month they have attempted five times to connect some kind of gym equipment to my watch. Not the first time. There's some kind of musical night light that my kids have and for a time none of our devices could ever connect to it. It turns out, the neighbour connected their phone to it and that device only allows 1 registered device at a time. I kind of punished them by keeping the musical lights on so they never get to hear their calls and their music (lol they're playing some kind of smooth jazz rnb). They finally got the point and probably removed our device from their phone.

 
But now, this. They are so bloody idiotic that they don't even know what their device names are. Maybe they do, and they just like to do that kind of nonsense to strangers because they can. Of course, all I have to do is tick the Cancel button every time they try to connect... but imagine if I do that to you 5 times a night... imagine I do that to you while you're in the middle of logging your workout from your watch? 
 
By the way, if I accept their gym equipment on my phone, they will have my health data. 
 
So, is there any engineering solution to this? As a UX Designer by trade, Ideally, I'd like to be able to BAN Bluetooth addresses so that they couldn't even find my device. But that's so dependent on what Bluetooth hardware can do in general. Do I have to bloody move to a new house that's 3/4 a kilometre away from any other houses? 
 
Please advice. 

 

 

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Samsung_Moderator
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We appreciate your feedback and will tag it on the forum so that it will appear with other feedback, ideas, and requests. This will allow your post to be more easily found in the event that Samsung product groups are seeking outside feedback/requests/ideas regarding our products.

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ZaCloud
Halo
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Galaxy Watch
Seconding this. There's so much wrong with how Bluetooth connecting is handled by Samsung. For example, I'd LOVE to be able to freely have my Bluetooth earbuds automatically connect to my phone, but the warning that other people in range could potentially connect to my devices makes me realize how insecure Bluetooth still can be when implemented poorly, despite being around for so long.

Why can't y'all just... make it so the auto-connect only applies to specifically registered devices that needed an initial matching code to finalize the pairing the first time (or if they're screen-less, then some kind of physical interaction with the device, to keep outsiders from being able to connect remotely)? Kind of how it already works for manual reconnecting, except also applying to automatic?

Make it so it can just remember the registered devices, & ONLY auto-connect to the ones on that list, & nobody else's.

And to keep from getting nagged by a stranger's connection code prompts all the time, maybe y'all can give us a Bluetooth Locked Mode option, where we tell it not to accept any more connection requests without a special password/biometrics we can set. Sending the attempting user a message like "This device is in Locked Mode & not accepting new connections at this time. Enter master password to unlock the connection." If we decide we want to unlock it/got a new device we want to add, then we can go into the menu & select Unlock Bluetooth Device, enter a special master password we've previously set, THEN we can get back into it. (And as a precaution in case people forget that password, then a specific shutdown/reset function, only doable on the physical device, can wipe everything so we can start over & make a new password. Or maybe it all just instead works with our phone's sign-in credentials/biometrics, etc?)

I dunno, just half-asleep spitballing. I just think it's ridiculous that there's a risk of total strangers connecting to my earbuds (or the buds connecting to their device), in 2023, when y'all could totally put some kind of actual authentication (& use of stored devices list which can be referred to as "only connect to these, & don't allow things other than these to connect") into this mess to fix it up.
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Pepperm1nt
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Why can't we just add Bluetooth networks/ devices "hidden network" setting like wifi? And of course, require an authentication code. Problem solved.
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Samsung_Moderator
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We appreciate your feedback and will tag it on the forum so that it will appear with other feedback, ideas, and requests. This will allow your post to be more easily found in the event that Samsung product groups are seeking outside feedback/requests/ideas regarding our products.

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