If you had asked me about the topic yesterday, I'd have said that tech has already hit "peak blockchain," but based on today's developments, I'm reassessing my views. Sirin Labs revealed its specs for the "first blockchain smartphone" earlier this year, and in a surprising twist, the specs for the Finney were actually realistic. Now the company has some visuals which show the industrial design for the phone, including a secondary "Safe Screen" running standalone firmware for enhanced wallet security.

This secondary screen "will be able to independently verify that Finney wallet transactions are being sent to the correct addresses, allowing users to verify they’re not being tricked by malware or hackers to send their cryptocurrencies or tokens to a fraudulent third party." So presumably one of Sirin's apps is able to pass transactions to this system for greater security.

We also knew the Finney was going to run Sirin OS—the company's "ultra-secure" fork for Android—and now some of its new features have been revealed. It will include a cold-storage wallet, token conversion service, multi-blockchain Dapp (decentralized app) store, and "a comprehensive and multi-layer cybersecurity suite," whatever that means. The token conversions are one of the more interesting bits, as Sirin claims it will work with purchases. Let's just hope the conversion rate isn't set to favor Sirin too much when it comes to fees.

Sirin has selected Foxconn to make the handset, and other industrial design features include 3D Gorilla glass on the front and back; a concave metal frame; notched display; and a "Shield Element" housing the camera, sensors, and fingerprint scanner. Most other specs remain unchanged, though the battery is getting a slight bump in capacity to 3,280mAh.

As someone very much interested in cryptocurrency developments (full disclosure: I made a lot of cash on Ethereum last year), I'm a bit concerned at the way many companies are shoehorning the term into phone marketing. Short of the addition of an additional secure element for key storage or transactions—like Sirin Labs is doing here—most of it seems like marketing fluff that's just trying to jump on the hype train. On that note...

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