With the untimely banning that the South Korean government is implementing country-wide on the sale of smartphones, it seems that Samsung may be looking at a way to put out its latest flagship, the Samsung Galaxy S5, earlier than previously planned.

In what could be the worst-case scenario for upcoming smartphones, the South Korean government will be putting a ban on the three carriers, SK Telecom, LG U+ and Korea Telecom by assigning a ban on selling smartphones on specific dates.

What's troubling for Samsung here would be that all of the dates will affect, one way or another, the selling of the Samsung Galaxy S5. Both Korea Telecom and SK Telecom will be off the grid on the actual April launch date, while the ban on LG U+ will affect the latter part of the supposed selling, reports Venture Beat.

Given this, new developments are now pointing to a possible earlier release date for the Samsung Galaxy S5, at least according to a report spotted by Phone Arena. An insider supposedly from SK Telecom had mentioned that selling the Samsung Galaxy S5 after April 5 would affect its performance in the market, considering how even LG U+ only has a few days to sell it if it does push through with the April 11 launch.

Though an April 5 release date is still pretty feasible, Phone Arena also quotes another source, this time suggesting that a March 27 release date, may also be possible for Samsun Galaxy S5.

While this would be a better timeline for the device, it's close to unlikely, given the earlier possible delays in production as well as the overall preparations of pushing the launch of the Samsung Galaxy S5 at an earlier date.

Still, an earlier launch than April 11 may already do wonders for Samsung's flagship for 2014. If the April 5 new release date (and the more likely) does push through, it will be able to not only bask in the market before the ban starts, it will also be among the first of its generation to already be available.

Samsung Galaxy S5 Active spotted?

Despite the waterproofing of the Samsung Galaxy S5, it seems that the Korean company is still planning to create a more rugged variant of its flagship phone, if the latest leak is to be believed.

GSM Arena has spotted tipster @evleaks' latest Twitter find, which is the SM-G870, touted to be the Samsung Galaxy S5 Active. Considering that the main difference of the Active version with the main flagship is the ruggedness of it, the report speculates the possibility of higher resistance to the elements, to the extent of military certifications.

This will certainly set it apart from the flagship, and still make it relevant enough when compared to the equally rumoured Samsung Galaxy S5 Neo, which has pared down specs of the original flagship.

Aside from spotting the model, @evleaks has also hinted that the Samsung Galaxy S5 Active may also come to two specified carriers, AT&T and Sprint, though other carriers have also been collectively mentioned to carry the handset.

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