Criminal lawsuit over iPhone battery slowdowns filed in France, where planned obsolescence...
Fallout continues to grow following the discovery that Apple slows down older phones with aging batteries to prevent random shutdowns, as a new criminal lawsuit in France aims to hit Apple's pocketbook -- and could even result in jail time.
The complaint filed by Halte l'Obsolescence Programme, or Stop Planned Obsolescence, could carry a maximum prison sentence of two years, a fine of up to 300,000 euros, and 5 percent of the company's profits, according to TheLocal.fr.
"It is our mission to defend customers and the environment against this waste organized by Apple," HOP cofounder Laetitia Vasseur said.
The lawsuit was filed on Wednesday, but prosecutors must first determine whether the complaint is legitimate before letting it proceed in court. France passed a law in August of 2015 making it illegal to "deliberately reduce the lifespan of a product to increase the rate of replacement."
Last week, Apple confirmed that it temporarily slows down processes on older iPhones when their internal batteries have degraded to a point where they are no longer operating near full capacity. The software-based changes are intended to prevent random shutdowns of older phones, which can be caused by spikes in power usage.
"Lithium-ion batteries become less capable of supplying peak current demands when in cold conditions, have low battery charge, or as they age over time, which can result in the device unexpectedly shutting down to protect its electronic components," Apple said in a statement.
The company revealed that it began implementing this change in 2016 with a software update for the iPhone 6, iPhone 6s, and iPhone SE. Support has since been expanded to the iPhone 7 with iOS 11.2.
However, the situation has helped to fuel a conspiracy theory suggesting that Apple intentionally slows down older iPhones, in order to compel users to purchase a new device. That is incorrect -- tests have conclusively proven that older iPhone hardware with an adequately functioning battery is no slower than it was at launch.
Some users have found that having the battery replaced on an older iPhone addresses the issue, as the software recognizes that the hardware is no longer depleted and ceases throttling. A battery replacement through Apple without an AppleCare+ warranty costs $79.
Beyond France, Apple has been hit with a number of lawsuits in the U.S., accusing Apple of using slowdowns to avoid fixing hardware flaws. The issue is also the subject of a government probe in South Korea.
The complaint filed by Halte l'Obsolescence Programme, or Stop Planned Obsolescence, could carry a maximum prison sentence of two years, a fine of up to 300,000 euros, and 5 percent of the company's profits, according to TheLocal.fr.
"It is our mission to defend customers and the environment against this waste organized by Apple," HOP cofounder Laetitia Vasseur said.
The lawsuit was filed on Wednesday, but prosecutors must first determine whether the complaint is legitimate before letting it proceed in court. France passed a law in August of 2015 making it illegal to "deliberately reduce the lifespan of a product to increase the rate of replacement."
Last week, Apple confirmed that it temporarily slows down processes on older iPhones when their internal batteries have degraded to a point where they are no longer operating near full capacity. The software-based changes are intended to prevent random shutdowns of older phones, which can be caused by spikes in power usage.
"Lithium-ion batteries become less capable of supplying peak current demands when in cold conditions, have low battery charge, or as they age over time, which can result in the device unexpectedly shutting down to protect its electronic components," Apple said in a statement.
The company revealed that it began implementing this change in 2016 with a software update for the iPhone 6, iPhone 6s, and iPhone SE. Support has since been expanded to the iPhone 7 with iOS 11.2.
However, the situation has helped to fuel a conspiracy theory suggesting that Apple intentionally slows down older iPhones, in order to compel users to purchase a new device. That is incorrect -- tests have conclusively proven that older iPhone hardware with an adequately functioning battery is no slower than it was at launch.
Some users have found that having the battery replaced on an older iPhone addresses the issue, as the software recognizes that the hardware is no longer depleted and ceases throttling. A battery replacement through Apple without an AppleCare+ warranty costs $79.
Beyond France, Apple has been hit with a number of lawsuits in the U.S., accusing Apple of using slowdowns to avoid fixing hardware flaws. The issue is also the subject of a government probe in South Korea.
Comments
Apple’s communication on this, however, was atrocious.
As the article says, there is no slowdown with fully functioning batteries.
Instead of suing Apple, customers should be thanking them for fixing the random shutdown issue.
I plugged it, hoping to wipe it and either sell it or use it like an iPod Touch.
However. it couldn't even charge enough to boot up. It stopped charging altogether.
When I took it to the Apple Store, they said I should just throw it away, the repair would be too expensive.
They didn't even have a definitive answer as to what was wrong with it.
Gotta love it.
Perhaps hidden revelations will surface, but on the face, Apple actions seem very reasonable.
So they introduced a new problem to fix the old problem, and only now are they acknowledging the new problem after they had been caught. If it didn't come out through testing, Apple would have never said anything.
Second: By ensuring that the phone works for longer they are reducing the waste not adding to it.
You can spin all the negative you want at this but you’re a complete tool if you do. Could Apple have handled this different with notifications? No because these same Negative Nellies will still complain about Apple slowing down their iPhone. Apple can’t win because for some retarded reason people want Apple to fail.
At a family Christmas visit, where most people have iPhones, this was surpisingly a hot topic - with non techy people.
And the consensus was that apple played a devious card by not telling them their phone battery was compromised, and thus slowing down the phone. People were angry that they probably upgraded from their 6 recently due it being slow as a snail when they could have just got a new battery. Even worse that you can go to an Apple store and they will test the battery and say its fine even though iOS is slowing down your CPU due to the battery. Thats unforgivable. My family agreed.
That lack of transparency is gonna cost Apple dearly. I heard family members considering Android (and Ive never heard any of them say this before). Perhaps Apple doesnt understand the level of anger here.
Apple needs to get some comms out there ASAP or face even more backlash. Its also not transparent that you cant even see easily how many cycles your battery has had. Why hide this info in a private API (it used to be public but they changed it... wonder why!)
It may well have been a solid technical fix but the way they went about it just reeks.
At this point, Ive also held off updating my iPhone 7 to 11.2. Not sure I will either. At this point, they have lost my trust. And to be honest, over the years that was worth a lot in $ terms to them. So I hope they find a way to regain it.
The reason this story has legs is because most people I know who keep their iPhones have noticed slowdowns. I believe it's 99% because of either operating system updates, software bugs, and memory getting full.
However, when personal experience meets conspiracy theory, it's like snowball meet hill.
The real issue is that software updates cause older phones to get slow. Of course, there are benefits in that users get the latest features, but a lot of consumers feel tricked when their phones suddenly become really slow.
Apple is at least guilty of piss-poor transparency in their communications with users. They knew there was a hardware problem with battery output and didn't come out and say it, nor did the phone give any indication an internal self-test had failed and the CPU was throttled. For an out-of-warranty device this would be acceptable to keep the device limping along provided Apple made engineering improvements to later devices to ensure phone performance isn't compromised because of normal battery degradation. Normal users expect reduced runtime, they don't expect the phone to operate at half-speed or randomly crash.
The real question is did Apple deliberately obscure the underlying issue in an attempt to avoid in-warranty repairs?
This particular lawsuit smells of political and social justice undertones by a biased organization. I don't think it will go anywhere outside of generating a few headlines.