FTC pledges to take on unlawful restrictions on right-to-repair
For the first time, the FTC has taken a formal stance against unlawful repair restrictions, echoing a position that the White House took less than a week ago.
Right-to-repair heats up with FTC support. Photo credit: Apple
The conversation surrounding the right-to-repair movement has accelerated recently with new legislation and tech leaders sharing their support. Apple's control of repair parts and authorized facilities make it a prime target for the movement.
The FTC has filed a policy statement taking a stance against unlawful repair practices. The statement was approved unanimously by the FTC and will be used to encourage competition in repair markets with "vigor."
"While efforts by dominant firms to restrict repair markets are not new, changes in technology and more prevalent use of software has created fresh opportunities for companies to limit independent repair," says FTC Chair Lina Khan. "These types of restrictions can significantly raise costs for consumers, stifle innovation, close off business opportunities for independent repair shops, create unnecessary electronic waste, delay timely repairs, and undermine resiliency."
The FTC statement says that the enforcement agency will ramp up efforts against repair restrictions that prevent small businesses, workers, consumers, and even government entities from fixing their own products. For example, while Apple itself is not cited, Apple only allows authorized repair facilities to order replacement parts or access diagnostic tools.
An iPhone user seeking to repair their device must visit Apple itself or choose from a list of repair facilities specifically chosen by Apple. Practically, that means that an average user cannot realistically repair their device, nor can they choose a different repair facility not affiliated with Apple and expect continued warranty coverage.
Apple isn't the only company with strict repair restrictions and part allocation rules. Microsoft has similar issues with the Surface line of products, and the extremely popular Xbox family of gaming consoles. Nintendo and Sony are similar with their gaming hardware as well. The FTC is expected to target any company that makes it difficult for consumers to repair their own devices.
The pledge comes only days after Washington asked the FTC to step up right-to-repair regulations. This FTC decision is among the first major anti-monopoly moves made by Lina Khan after becoming the new chair.
Read on AppleInsider
Right-to-repair heats up with FTC support. Photo credit: Apple
The conversation surrounding the right-to-repair movement has accelerated recently with new legislation and tech leaders sharing their support. Apple's control of repair parts and authorized facilities make it a prime target for the movement.
The FTC has filed a policy statement taking a stance against unlawful repair practices. The statement was approved unanimously by the FTC and will be used to encourage competition in repair markets with "vigor."
"While efforts by dominant firms to restrict repair markets are not new, changes in technology and more prevalent use of software has created fresh opportunities for companies to limit independent repair," says FTC Chair Lina Khan. "These types of restrictions can significantly raise costs for consumers, stifle innovation, close off business opportunities for independent repair shops, create unnecessary electronic waste, delay timely repairs, and undermine resiliency."
The FTC statement says that the enforcement agency will ramp up efforts against repair restrictions that prevent small businesses, workers, consumers, and even government entities from fixing their own products. For example, while Apple itself is not cited, Apple only allows authorized repair facilities to order replacement parts or access diagnostic tools.
An iPhone user seeking to repair their device must visit Apple itself or choose from a list of repair facilities specifically chosen by Apple. Practically, that means that an average user cannot realistically repair their device, nor can they choose a different repair facility not affiliated with Apple and expect continued warranty coverage.
Apple isn't the only company with strict repair restrictions and part allocation rules. Microsoft has similar issues with the Surface line of products, and the extremely popular Xbox family of gaming consoles. Nintendo and Sony are similar with their gaming hardware as well. The FTC is expected to target any company that makes it difficult for consumers to repair their own devices.
The pledge comes only days after Washington asked the FTC to step up right-to-repair regulations. This FTC decision is among the first major anti-monopoly moves made by Lina Khan after becoming the new chair.
Read on AppleInsider
Comments
But I do see that Apple should provide an avenue for repair centers to become authorized to service Apple products meaning, they get trained, they are able to get Apple diagnosing capabilities, the ability to get genuine Apple parts to put back into someone's device, etc. A service center should be able to have the ability to reprogram a TouchID sensor or whatever Apple is able to do that others are not. As long as that business goes through proper channels then thats fine. If that shop continuously screws up the customer will not want to keep going back. Apple can develop a system (it kinda already has one) where everything can be tracked to make sure things are done properly and in a way where everyone has an equal chance. Apple could somehow be able to track what's going on with businesses to make sure of things like scamming people, making sure repairs are done accurately, etc.
I don't however think it's a great idea to allow just anyone and everyone to repair a device. There are many out there who think they know what they're doing and they're in fact very dangerous. Then they screw up the device and will expect Apple to fix it, or they'll just sell it fixed half-ass and eventually this could in turn harm Apple's reputation for quality products.
Apple has justifiable reasons for restricting repairs to trained personnel, but they also have unjustifiable reasons for it. The decision that needs to be made is whether or not the level of harm from the existing situation is great enough to justify changing, recognising that unforeseen consequences can impact the balance of harm vs benefit. And given the energy stored in batteries these days, the potential harms are great indeed, both to consumers/users and the corporations that manufacture the devices - look at what happened to Samsung after the "explodophone" disaster, and imagine what could have happened had Samsung been an American company.
Proper testing is part of the deal when you go to any shop. If I take my Toyota to Mike's Brakes and he does a crappy job and I'm killed in a crash, it's Mike's Brakes that gets sued. Any attempt to go after Toyota would be thrown out with prejudice. Same goes if I take my iPad to Mike's Phone Repair and they accidentally turn it into a bomb, any attempt to go after Apple would be squashed pretty fast.
Genuine parts is a huge issue though. Heck even in the military and aerospace they occasionally run into substandard bogus party parts. I suspect even Apple itself has had to deal with it.
Agreed an iPhone is not a car. A car is far more complex. Other than screens and batteries what else are people clamouring to replace? If something goes wrong on the MB even Apple just swaps out the whole thing. iFixit disassembly pages have gotten pretty short in the last few years. Once the case of the whatever-it-is is open, usually there's not much to see. There are normally only a few discrete modules.
If Apple allowed third parties to replace screens and batteries, most of the people pushing for Right To Repair would be satisfied. Let anything beyond that be a factory repair.
Your argument falls entirely flat since the exact same one could be made for cars, but car repairs are allowed by anyone. Unlike a phone, which is incredibly unlikely to kill or seriously maim anyone if repaired incorrectly, a badly repaired car could kill the occupant, passengers, other car drivers and pedestrians. And yet third party garages exist and indeed any person is allowed to repair and modify their own cars with no oversight. In fact car manufacturers are required to make all parts available to anyone who wishes to buy them.
People who are incapable of repairing their own vehicle generally don't attempt the repair, and if a botched repair results in an accident the person who carried out the repair is responsible. If a third party part is found to be at fault, the supplier of that part is the responsible party as long as it has been installed correctly. No one tries to sue VW because someone caused a death by screwing up a repair to the brakes on their car. Similarly VW could easily recognise a botched repair and then refuse to honour warranty, which would be fair enough since repairs under warranty should always be done by the manufacturer.
Apple changed policy recently to allow repairs even if the display or battery has been replaced by a counterfeit part, so they can't be too worried about the blame potential.
The idea that people would blame Apple if a third party battery blows up is a weak straw man. Apple is anti-right to repair for one reason, and that is Cook knows there's plenty of profit to be made from Apple's expensive repairs.
Car manufacturers aren't held responsible for damages caused by third party repairs, and neither will Apple be held so.
A battery in a smartphone should not be anymore of a health hazard to a technician than a pair of scissors.
Some people are working on improving that side of things.
https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9103086