Samsung admits to blocking leaked S Voice app, calls it a ‘test version’

Samsung has confirmed to us that it is blocking S Voice, the Siri-esque voice-controlled assistant which leaked a few days ago as part of the Galaxy S III ROM. The company claims that the leaked app is an “initial test version” that may not be representative of the final product, though doesn’t say whether or not devices other than the Galaxy S III will be able to access the service following its official launch.

“An initial test version of S Voice which was found online has been blocked as Samsung Electronics does not want consumers to judge the quality of the voice feature based on a test version. When the product is launched, users of GALAXY S III will be able to fully experience S Voice.”

The app is indeed now completely non-functional on the phone we originally tested it on, returning a “Network error” message to any kind of request. We thought S Voice performed reasonably well when it was working before, but of course can’t vouch for its quality on the Galaxy S III — we’ll give the final version a workout once we have the phone in our hands.