How much are you willing to pay for your phone’s security? Certainly, not 14,000 dollars!

But a new company called Sirin Labs hopes to cash in on the fact that we live in very unsafe times, and that our smartphones need that extra protection. Seems it has staked its future on the rich and wealthy who believe their privacy and security to be priceless.

But the price – $14,000 dollars, which is close to Rs 9,40,000 INR – is surely messing up with our heads.

The Israeli startup Sirin Labs’ launched its ambitious new smartphone, the Solarin which it claims is the ‘world’s most secure smartphone’. But do the features it offers really justify the hefty cost?

Dubbed as the ‘Rolls Royce of smartphones’, Solarin, the 5.5-inch Android smartphone was launched on Tuesday at an event in London loaded with bombastic claims about being the very best.

b’The launch event/Source: Twitter/Verge’
  • Solarin packs in Qualcomm Snapdragon 810 processor, promises “far superior” Wi-Fi connectivity, has a 23.8MP rear camera and a 5.5 inch IPS LED 2K resolution screen.
  • It has a 4,000mAh battery and a very bright 1440p IPS LCD display and 4GB of RAM and 128GB of non-expandable storage.
  • The company calls its camera ‘the best in the world’ but reviewers have said that its pictures are blurry and unimpressive.
  • And the fact that this phone has just one SIM card slot makes it all the more less desirable.

But why are we even talking about these specifications? Its selling point is not the spec, but the fact that it uses the same communication encryption technology as the military and offers super security. 

Here are the features through which the phone claims to protect your ‘high value’ information:

  • Solarin comes with the latest Google security patches pre-installed
  • It also has a switch on the back that throws it into ‘super-secure’ mode.
  • Essentially, outgoing calls only, and all messages are securely encrypted. 
  • In this environment, your data is protected by 256-bit AES encryption, backed up by security firms Zimperium and Koolspan.
  • There’s even a secure concierge service that monitors the state of your phone and warns you of incoming attacks.

And this is the explanation the company gave about its super product. Moshe Hogeg, co-founder of Sirin Labs, said at the launch event,

“Our customers are very, very smart people. Sirin Labs’ ‘core customers’ are international business travellers, entrepreneurs, and partners in financial firms. These people who communicate a lot have very high security needs, and that’s where Solarin steps in, featuring partnerships with security firms Koolspan and Zimperium to secure the phone and your data on it.”

But even if with these claims, do you really have that kind of private information which needs to be so fervently secured? Well, not unless you are from the FBI!