SK telecom hints at offering call recording feature for iPhone users

The logo of SK telecom’s A dot. [Courtesy of SK telecom]

South Korea’s top mobile carrier SK telecom Co. is expected to offer a call recording feature for iPhone users through its artificial intelligence (AI) platform A dot.

According to SK telecom officials on Sunday, the call recording service, the lack of which has been a long-standing inconvenience for Korean iPhone users, will be available this year through a special application.

The feature will initially support outgoing calls made from the mobile phones of SK telecom’s subscribers. The company had reviewed adding an iPhone call recording feature to its own mobile application T Phone but eventually decided to integrate the feature with A dot.

While the current A dot Android version offers call summary features, the A dot application’s FAQ states that “the feature currently cannot be used on iPhones” but added “it will be released for iPhones soon,” signaling the release of an iOS version.

Once SK telecom’s call recording feature is implemented on the iPhone, the phone’s market share will expand in the domestic market as it will alleviate the inconvenience experienced by iPhone users in Korea.

Apple Pay has also been available in Korea since March 2023.

According to a smartphone usage survey conducted by Gallup Korea in July, Samsung Electronics Co. accounted for 69 percent of the smartphones currently in use while Apple accounted for 23 percent. Apple’s market share increased by 3 percentage points from a year earlier.

SK telecom is expected to introduce the call recording feature in October, coinciding with the domestic release of the iPhone 15 which Apple unveiled last week.

The A dot-based call recording feature is likely to act as an incentive to attract new iPhone subscribers.