Apple sued for slowing down old phones
SAN FRANCISCO: Apple Inc defrauded iPhone users by slowing devices without warning to compensate for poor battery performance, according to eight suits filed in the week since the company opened up about the yearold software change.
The tweak may have led iPhone owners to misguided attempts to resolve issues over the last year, the suits contend.
The suits — filed in United States district courts in California, New York and Illinois — seek class-action to represent potentially millions of iPhone owners.
A similar case was lodged in an Israeli court on Monday, the newspaper Haaretz reported.
The company acknowledged last week for the first time in detail that operating system updates released since “last year” for the iPhone 6, iPhone 6s, iPhone SE and iPhone 7 included a feature “to smooth out” power supply from batteries that were cold, old or low on charge.
Phones without the adjustment would shut down abruptly because of a precaution designed to prevent components from getting fried, said Apple.
The disclosure followed a December 18 analysis by Primate Labs, which develops an iPhone performance measuring app, that identified blips in processing speed and concluded that a software change had to be behind them.
One of the suits filed here last week said “the batteries’ inability to handle the demand created by processor speeds” without the software patch was a defect.
“Rather than curing the battery defect by providing a free battery replacement for affected iPhones, Apple sought to mask the battery defect,” according to the complaint. Reuters