Apple to pay $3.4 million to Chilean iPhone users over 'batterygate' lawsuit

Office of the Attorney General Becerra in a settlement reached on Wednesday asked Apple Inc to pay USD 3.4 million in compensation to the Chilean customers against a lawsuit that alleged 'planned obsolescence' of older iPhones. Filed by the Organisation of Consumers and Users (Odecu), the lawsuit was brought against Apple Chile in 2018 and it stated that the company purposely fitted batteries with limitations in the handsets that throttled performance, prompting the iOS users to upgrade the model.  The scandal had come to be known as "Batterygate" as it involved aging batteries to push the iPhone customers to invest in the new devices. 

While the settlement is first of a kind in Latin America, Attorney General Becerra's Office had already announced $113 in compensation to the customers in at least 33 US states, including Washington. The iPhone users made allegations that Apple fitted its iPhone 6 and iPhone 7 generation phones, as well as its first-generation iPhone SE phones with batteries that were·particularly susceptible to performance loss over time. This led to a higher than expected number of "unexpected power-offs" ("UPOs") as the phones aged, the aggravated customers said in a lawsuit, dragging MacOnline and local online store Reifschneider. 

"Apple is one of the world's largest cell-phone manufacturers and makes the popular line of iPhone smartphones. Apple's iPhones are powered by lithium-ion batteries, which lose the ability to provide voltage over time. Because utilizing peak processing power with a degraded battery can damage a phone's electronic hardware, iPhones are programmed to automatically shut off when a battery can no longer provide sufficient voltage to support necessary processing power," the lawsuit read. 

Apple's 'false claims' about improvements 

According to the customers' complaints, after iPhone released the update for the operating system, it downgraded the iPhone's processing performance as the battery drained or slowed down or "throttled". Apple's throttled iPhone performance manifested itself in many ways noticeable to iPhone owners, the lawsuit alleged, saying, for example, throttled phones took longer to launch apps, it lowered frame rates while scrolling, reduced screen brightness, and lowered speaker volume.

Overall, iPhone performance was noticeably slower in throttled phones than in the new handsets. As many as 150,000 iPhone 6, 6 Plus, 6s Plus, 7, 7 Plus, and SE users sued the company. The Chilean customers alleged that Apple's public statements about the iPhone 6, the first-generation iPhone SE, and the iPhone 7 were "directly contrary to the realities of the battery performance". Apple also made false claims, saying, it "made improvements to reduce occurrences of unexpected shutdowns." 

"Apple withheld information about their batteries that slowed down iPhone performance, all while passing it off as an update. This type of behaviour hurts the pockets of consumers and limits their ability to make informed purchases. Today's settlement ensures consumers will have access to the information they need to make a well-informed decision when purchasing and using Apple products," Becerra said in a statement released by the office of the Attorney General. 

(Image Credit: Twitter/@AGBecerra/Unsplash)