It may seem counterintuitive to switch to reality on a phone that manually covers your camera and microphone — unless you’re worried about someone eavesdropping on you.
That’s the appeal of the Hiroh, a $1,100 privacy-focused Android smartphone released in late April that I saw among the tech on display at MWC 2026. While it may sound silly to wonder who’s listening or watching you through your personal phone, some people in sensitive positions, like many government contractors, need phones with disabled cameras and microphones. Some would rather be safe than sorry when it comes to personal privacy, often or when traveling to countries where digital snooping is more likely.
Ten years after the Facebook Cambridge Analytica scandal, people are becoming more aware of how their activity and data is being collected by the owners of the services and products they use. There have long been privacy-focused alternatives to popular software, but the hardware is working, with devices like the Punkt MC03 and other phones deliberately limiting app and software access to people’s data. The Hiroh is another way to appeal to people with these concerns, with access to more apps and better cameras than current privacy phones, Hiroh CEO Victor Cocchia told me.
“What I’ve seen in the last 15 years is that many people don’t want to give up simple things to be safe. They want to be able to do everything because we’ve become so dependent on our phones,” said Cocchia.
The Hiroh phone is the first device from the company of the same name, created by veteran phone makers that produce a device for a privacy-conscious audience. On the face of it, the Hiroh doesn’t look too different from most of the other phones we saw at MWC as a regular smartphone with a glass front and black back, equipped with a 108-megapixel main camera.
On the left side of Hiroh’s phone is a privacy switch that cuts off access to the microphone and camera — when it’s on, the light turns red.
The only thing that gives viewers a clue that Hiroh has something going on are the two physical switches on either side of the phone. Another change mentioned above is on the left side of the phone to turn off the cameras and microphones, which happens at the circuit level. Once it’s turned off, the app can’t turn itself back on, Cocchia said.
He demonstrated how it works during a phone call, where I heard his voice coming from the other phone’s speaker until he turned off the privacy button. Go through the camera. When the privacy button is on, a red light indicates that the feature is engaged.
“[With the toggle on,] from the government’s point of view, if I am in the field talking to someone, I know that I am not being attacked. If I’m doing business in a meeting, I know someone’s not getting my IP,” Cocchia said. “And if I’m a consumer, I know the apps on my phone aren’t listening to what I’m saying.”
To Hiroh’s right is another switch, which disconnects all connections when the switch is thrown — essentially, it’s a very nice Airplane Mode switch, but disconnects all connections, including Wi-Fi and Bluetooth. This ensures that apps don’t leak your location or tap your other sensors, like the gyrometer or altimeter, to dig up more information.
That’s part of the hardware, but Hiroh also has privacy features in its software. It has an official app with text messaging, email and other communication options encrypted at the edge — friends you want to communicate with securely only need to download the free Hiroh app and send messages within it.
Hiroh’s phone’s EOS operating system also has advanced privacy options to further stymie surveillance and data collection.
Hiroh’s other privacy software is the phone’s operating system itself. By default, the phone uses the EOS operating system, created by the European company Murena as an open-source alternative to Android with strong privacy controls, including a settings submenu with options to block app trackers and ads, spoil a person’s location and even hide their IP address through the TOR network.
If people want, they can choose to buy a stock Android phone instead and get the benefits of physical flexibility. It may do a worse job of protecting user data than the EOS version, but it’s still better than most other phones.
The Hiroh is otherwise a standard Android smartphone, with a 6.67-inch display, a single 108-megapixel camera, a single 13-megapixel telephoto camera and a 2-megapixel ultrawide camera on the back and a 32-megapixel selfie shooter on the front. It’s powered by the Dimensity 8300 chip and has 16GB of memory and 256GB of storage to boot, with a microSD slot for up to 2TB of additional encrypted storage. In accordance with EU law, Hiroh provides five years of software and security updates. Cocchia noted that Hiroh plans to add more privacy-focused apps in the future as part of its support strategy.
In contrast to the Hiroh, the Punkt MC03 smartphone I saw at CES takes a more extreme and transparent approach to app privacy, allowing owners to dial the app’s privacy settings up or down to allow normal use or completely isolate it from the world to protect user data. But MC03 also requires a paid monthly subscription to add to its development and support.
Hiroh has a strong approach to privacy, which makes it even more attractive to the average phone owner who is just starting their privacy protection journey and can use a more familiar interface. But both represent a new era of devices that put privacy more in the hands of the people who use the devices, not the companies that favor their customers’ information.
