This should be the next thing for the EU to target. Just because your Android version is seven years old is no good reason for your bank to reject it.
This gets into issues of hardware and software churn. My laptop is ten years old. Aside from being a little slow, I can still install the latest version of Linux on it and have a fully up-to-date system.
First, there should be a mandate that all smartphone sellers—either the manufacturer or the phone company—be required to take back the device at end of its (useful) life at no charge to the customer, and that the device be reused, recycled, or securely stored. Putting the burden on the supplier instead of the public to handle obsolete devices should cause a slowdown in the relentless push to add more features in the quest to sell even more new devices.
Second, although this will be more difficult, mandate that all smartphones must be upgradeable to the latest version of the operating system, or a suitable approximation thereof, for a period of at least ten years from the date of manufacture. It won't be easy: the hardware in smartphones is a mess of proprietary hardware and the equivalent mess of software blobs needed to interact with them. Requiring they be maintainable and accessible for a full decade will mean either maintaining a large library of these software blobs across multiple versions of the OS (a big burden on the supplier) or a much more robust hardware ecosystem—a win for the consumer and the folks who to maintain the operating system.
Ultimately, these mandates should force the industry away from the current walled garden approach of proprietary peripheral hardware and software blobs toward a more modular, standardized hardware ecosystem, similar to the PC industry. This would be a win for consumers and the environment.
For me, sustainability is more important than any corporation's balance sheet.
