Samsung explains how it kept the Galaxy S III secret: made three versions to avoid leaks

Samsung’s Galaxy S III is without a doubt the most hyped Android smartphone so far this year, probably generating as much excitement as the iPhone, but under such huge pressure from everyone to learn more about it even before it got announced, how did Samsung manage to keep it a secret? It’s Apple-style security and measures straight out of a movie, all explained by the company now that the Galaxy S III has finally landed.

First of all, in order to cut leaks, Samsung picked its all-star team of only a few people to work on the Galaxy S III. Usually, the company would have a much larger team working on a handset with a lot of people getting involved along the way. Not for the Galaxy S III. This needed to be kept top secret all the way, and that’s what Samsung did.

Samsung dedicated a separate lab where one could enter only with a security card and passing through a fingerprint reader and all that fancy stuff. The various prototypes then would be put into security boxes just, even if just to be taken across the hallway. 

Interestingly, Samsung went on and made three different versions of the Samsung Galaxy S III to avoid the real one from leaking out.

And when it came to showing the device to testers and operators, no third-party companies were hired as usually. Samsung took care of logistics itself with someone doing a lengthy tour across various countries just to show the prototypes. Even for the order of the materials themself, the engineers had to explain what they’d be like and still work with no photographs.

If that wasn’t tight enough some of the engineers working on the project were stormed with questions from their family and friends about their secret project.

“I got so many questions about the GALAXY S III from friends and family”, said YoungDoo Jin, Senior Engineer at Samsung.“But I’d say ‘don’t ask me or you’ll get me fired.’ I told them to check it out after it was officially made public.” 

One of the kids of another enigeer knew he’d worked on the original Galaxy S and its sequel and assumed daddy is working on the next big thing from Samsung. The engineer explains the weird dialogs he had: ‘Dad! You’re making the S III, right?,’ his son asked, but the awkward response was always ‘I don’t really know.’ 

So now you know how tough it was for the people at Samsung themselves to remain silent and keep absolute secrecy about the Galaxy S III. We think, it was all worth the wait and with a launch date nearing in the States, most of you should be able to see the fruits of that labor very soon.

source: Samsung Tomorrow via SammyHub