II have bought refurbished Samsung phones in UK before and never gave it a second thought, but I said if I factory reset the phone when I receive it, all is back to its original factory clean setup, right !?

 

But I am now thinking what if the firmware is tampered with and the phone is flashed. This is a bit far fetched and hypothetical, but can they create a firmware with exact original name and number and flash the phone - you can put any malware you like on it and none the wiser ...!?

 

How is it possible to check that the firmware is the original Samsung one and untouched...?

 

I did have a quick online chat with a Samsung support, he said you can check the firmware name and number, but isn't that just assigned detail, anyone creating a firmware can choose what they like to assign, what is needed is a bit checksum like MD5 or SHA1 hash etc...!

 

In some cases they even open the box of a new phone, so it's no longer factory sealed (or even re-seal it), how can we say if the phone is brand new and the  firmware not tampered with  ?

 

We can´t say that it´s not tampered with. Today, they can copy and clone almost everything. That´s why you should buy it from reputable sources. But, then again. How many do not produce all their phone in China, Taiwan, Korea and so on.......

So, the result. If we think like this, then we can almost not be sure when using any product with a microchip.

Theoretically possible that the firmware has been tampered.

If you are worried about this you should flash the firmware yourself, then you know 100% what's on your phone.

48 minutes ago, FriendlyFarang said:

Theoretically possible that the firmware has been tampered.

If you are worried about this you should flash the firmware yourself, then you know 100% what's on your phone.

That was my first thought, I have flashed a couple of phones before, just root and connect to the laptop and easy...

 

But those days I just downloaded the original firmware from some website - didn't think much how reliable or safe it was...!!! 

 

Now I asked the Samsung support if I can download the firmware from their website, he said no can do ...! He said for that you need to take your phone to a Samsung service station and the engineer will do it - it is an option I might consider ... , although not sure if they just do it for free if there is no fault, and just a suspension... !?