Your friends haven't disappeared from Samsung Health — Here's what's up with the asterisks

Most activities tend to be more fun when done with others, and working out is no exception. Samsung Health offers a sense of this feeling by allowing users to add friends and compete with them in fitness goals. Recently, some users have noticed an issue with their friend lists, but this issue appears to be part of a feature rather than a bug.

Users have been reporting a problem with how friends appear in the Samsung Health app. While normally you would see names and photos of your friends in global challenges, the photos have disappeared and the names have been replaced by asterisk symbols. If you’re confused by this development, a member of the Samsung Health Service Operations team has shed some light on what’s happening.

On Samsung’s community forum, the moderator explains that version 7.1 of the app has added profile visibility settings for privacy protection. Depending on the user’s profile privacy settings, their name will be displayed as asterisks in challenges and more. These settings can be changed by going to Samsung Health Settings and tapping on the Together section.

In other Samsung-related news, Galaxy Buds users could soon get new instructions on what to do when their earbuds are overheating. The change contradicts the previous official support guidance.