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Apple Hit With Class Action Lawsuit After Admitting To Slowing Down Old iPhones (appleinsider.com)

Posted by BeauHD on from the didn't-see-that-coming dept.

An anonymous reader quotes a report from Apple Insider: A day after Apple acknowledged slowing down iPhones with degraded batteries, a Los Angeles man is pursuing a class action lawsuit in the matter. Owners didn't agree to the prospect, and it hurts the devices' value, according to a filing by plaintiff Stefan Bodganovich, cited by TMZ. The case is said to be particularly concerned with the impact on iPhone 7 users. The suit asks that Apple stop throttling older devices, and pay compensation to affected people. Over the course of December, a number of people on Reddit and elsewhere have speculated that iPhones perform faster after battery replacements, mostly citing anecdotal evidence. Apple effectively confirmed that situation on Wednesday, but with the provision that it only throttles phones to prevent sudden, potentially damaging shutdowns. UPDATE: A second lawsuit has been filed against the company. Chicago Sun-Times reports "five customers have filed a federal lawsuit in Chicago against the tech giant for what they're calling 'deceptive, immoral and unethical' practices that violate consumer protection laws."

10 of 244 comments (clear)

  1. Buy a newerer fasterer one by Mr+D+from+63 · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Slow down old phones, customers see how much faster the new ones are....profit!

    1. Re:Buy a newerer fasterer one by jellomizer · · Score: 4, Insightful

      I expect it is. However I don't expect the Class action to win. This seems that Apple was doing its best to extend the life of older devices vs trying to shorten it. Could they have done better? Yes. They could have given an option to turn such a feature on or off, Set a notification that the battery is no longer optimal... Have a little more press in getting a battery fix for older phones, as it is possible....

      --
      If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
  2. Re: Make Energy... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

    He's the original boob and this was probably his idea.

  3. No fan of apple but... by thegarbz · · Score: 3, Insightful

    This is retarded. There's clear reasons why someone would potentially want this feature. The suit shouldn't request they stop doing it, but rather make it optional and put it in control of the user.

    Full disclosure: Typing this on a laptop which gives me the choice of performance or battery life in the power settings.

    1. Re:No fan of apple but... by Baron_Yam · · Score: 4, Insightful

      >This is retarded. There's clear reasons why someone would potentially want this feature.

      No, they were deceptive. Obviously the feature is great when it stops your phone from rebooting... but paired with hiding it (instead of say, giving a battery condition alert) and making the battery non-replaceable, what they've really done is put an artificial expiry date into their phones.

      Even if they didn't mean to be deceptive (and I'd bet the engineers didn't, but don't ask me to extend the same credit to sales & marketing), that just makes it unintentionally deceptive.

      They still need a good hard smack to help them never do anything like this again.

    2. Re:No fan of apple but... by Junta · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Additionally, in laptop land they tend to issue a warning when battery performance is degraded compared to original condition. It wouldn't be such a terrible idea for mobile devices to do the same, so long as there were a reasonable way to service the battery (which often there is not).

      --
      XML is like violence. If it doesn't solve the problem, use more.
  4. Re: Unsurprising by Bing+Tsher+E · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I would prefer to be notified so I can make an informed choice. Not have my iGadget mysteriously degrade performance in a time period when it would encourage me to buy a new unit. Perhaps it should prompt for three choices:

    1. Accept performance degradation.
    2. Accept reduced battery life.
    3. Come in to replace battery.

  5. Future news - lawsuit settled by Kohath · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Class action lawsuit settled. Lawyers to get $30 million. Phone customers to get a coupon for $5 off a new iPhone.

  6. We need to start taxing by nightfire-unique · · Score: 1, Insightful

    We need to start taxing devices into which batteries have been glued. If an end-user can't replace the battery themselves, the lifespan of electronic devices is cut significantly. This results in more waste, and should be taxed accordingly.

    This practice needs to stop.

    --
    A government is a body of people notably ungoverned - AC
    1. Re:We need to start taxing by TheFakeTimCook · · Score: 3, Insightful

      We need to start taxing devices into which batteries have been glued. If an end-user can't replace the battery themselves, the lifespan of electronic devices is cut significantly. This results in more waste, and should be taxed accordingly.

      This practice needs to stop.

      Apple has a flat-rate iPhone battery replacement service for $79.

      Now what?