Owners of the Samsung Galaxy S III on AT&T and Sprint were recently treated to small updates that, unfortunately for those users, disabled the device's ability to use the Google search bar to look for items on the phone itself. Instead, the Galaxy S III could only find results online. Samsung today issued a statement on why these updates have removed the universal search functionality. The company's full comment to Phone Scoop is as follows:

"Samsung has updated the software for the Galaxy S III as a precautionary measure to ensure that U.S. consumers may enjoy using our innovative products without interruption."

While Samsung didn't mention its ongoing legal battle with Apple in its statement, one of the patents that the companies have been duking it out in the court room over is related to this universal search feature. Apple won a preliminary injunction against the Galaxy Nexus with that patent, though that injunction has temporarily been stayed. I'm sure Samsung doesn't want to risk having the Galaxy S III face a similar fate, so it's just removing the feature in question for now. There's no word on when or if the T-Mobile and Verizon variants will receive similar updates. While the universal search feature may not be an integral part of the Galaxy S III, it is a handy thing to have, and hopefully it won't be long before AT&T and Sprint Galaxy S III owners will have it back. How many of you are currently using an AT&T or Sprint Galaxy S III that's had its universal search functionality disabled?

Via Phone Scoop