The features announced Friday by the world's leading mobile-phone maker will protect the Samsung Galaxy S5, which goes on sale next week in the U.S. The models sold by wireless carriers Verizon Wireless and U.S. Cellular will include "Find My Mobile" and "Reactivation Lock" anti-theft options that users can activate for free.
The announcement comes as prosecutors in San Francisco, New York and law enforcement officials nationwide have been demanding manufacturers create "kill" switches to combat surging smartphone theft across the nation.
Samsung says its new measures lock the phone if there's an unauthorized attempt to reset it.
Apple created a similar "activation lock" feature for the iPhone last year.
"The decision ... to provide Samsung's Find My Mobile and Reactivation Lock features on Galaxy S5 smartphones and to allow those features to be activated for free is a step forward in our effort to ensure the industry makes effective theft deterrents available on every smartphone sold in America," New York's attorney general, Eric Schneiderman, and San Francisco's district attorney, George Gascon, said in a statement.
Schneiderman and Gascon, along with London Mayor Boris Johnson, are co-chairs of the coalition Secure Our Smartphone Initiative.
They said, however, that they remain "concerned that consumers will need to opt in to the system, thereby limiting the ubiquity and effectiveness of the solution."
Both Schneiderman and Gascon have criticized the cellphone industry for what they say is a perceived unwillingness to solve an escalating theft problem.
Schneiderman has publicly supported bills currently in the U.S. House of Representatives and Senate that would require a kill switch to be installed in every smartphone manufactured in the United States. The switch would prevent the phone from being re-activated in the black market.
In 2012, 1.6 million Americans were victimized for their smartphones, according to Schneiderman's office.
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