Five years ago, many people had jointly sued Apple. This case was about listening to the conversations of users without permission. This was a class action lawsuit and now Apple wants to settle it. Apple has agreed to pay 95 million US dollars i.e. approximately Rs 817 crore for the settlement.
Apple was accused of playing with the privacy of users through Siri in its devices. Let us tell you that Siri is Apple’s virtual assistant which is found in every smartphone and other Apple devices.
Many allegations were made against Apple in this class action lawsuit. One of these allegations was that the company listens to people’s conversations without permission through Siri. Siri is Apple’s voice assistant which is provided in every Apple devices.
It was also alleged that Apple’s voice assistant Siri records people’s conversations without user permission. Apple was also accused of sharing voice recordings of users with advertisers.
These Apple users will get money…
Apple can give money to users of Apple’s Siri enabled devices purchased between September 17, 2014 and December 31, 2024. If this settlement is approved then the company will give 20 dollars (approximately Rs 1720) to every user.
These devices include iPhones, iPads, Apple Watches, MacBooks, HomePods, iPod touch and Apple TVs. All users can claim for their different devices, but only the user will have the option on a maximum of five devices.
Although Apple is ready for settlement, a hearing has been scheduled for it on February 14. If the settlement is approved on the same day, Apple will send a notice to its affected customers. The users who will be reached out by Apple will not only get money. Along with the money, this company will also make sure that their private phone calls are permanently deleted.
Victory for users…
Experts believe that in a way this is a victory for Apple users, but if this matter was not settled then Apple could have been fined much bigger. Because under America’s Wiretap Act, if the court had found Apple guilty in this class action lawsuit and sentenced it, the company would have had to pay a penalty of up to 1.5 billion dollars.
If there was a penalty of 1.5 billion dollars, then all the users who were affected by this could have got a huge amount. But the vendors, who are filing a class action lawsuit on behalf of Apple users, took the path of settling the matter with Apple.
Interestingly, this class action suit was filed against Apple five years ago. However, Apple has refused to accept its mistake and has said that people’s voice recording was done unknowingly through Siri.
In the settlement of this class action suit, the company alleges that Siri was inadvertently activated after the launch of the Hey Siri feature in 2014, which started recording without users saying Hey Siri.