Apple will pay $95 million to settle a proposed class action lawsuit over ‘unlawful and intentional recording’ of Siri interactions, reports Reuters. The lawsuit, first filed five years ago, alleges that Apple recorded conversations that were captured when Siri was accidentally activated, and shared that information with third-party advertisers.
U.S. District Judge Jeffrey White still has to approve the settlement in Oakland, California federal court, which was submitted with Apple’s agreement on Tuesday.
The lawsuit dates back to 2019, when two plaintiffs claimed that after speaking about certain products, their devices showed ads for those products. An additional plaintiff claimed he received ads for specific surgical treatment after discussing the treatment with his doctor in a private conversation.
A report at the time revealed that contractors had access to private conversations when Siri was accidentally activated. The contractors had been hired by Apple to evaluate Siri recordings to make improvements to the service. Employees reported having heard private data, including confidential medical information, drug deals, intimate moments, and more.
While Apple was open about the fact that some Siri recordings were analyzed by humans, but the company’s privacy terms at the time did not explicitly state that there was human oversight of Siri. The plaintiffs that filed the lawsuit said that Apple did not inform consumers that they are “regularly being recorded without consent,” and that they would not have purchased Apple devices had they known about the recordings.
The first filing of the lawsuit was dismissed in February 2021, after the court found that it did not include enough concrete data about the recordings that Apple allegedly collected. An amended lawsuit, which focused on Siri recordings used for “targeted advertising” was refiled in September 2021, and was allowed to go forward.
There is no evidence that Apple provided either Siri recordings or information from Siri recordings to advertisers. Plus, Apple’s privacy policies have long made it clear that any data collected from Siri for the purpose of improving the feature is anonymized and not associated with a specific user.
As is traditional for settlements like these, Apple “continues to deny any and all alleged wrongdoing and liability, specifically denies each of the Plaintiffs’ contentions and claims, and continues to deny that the Plaintiffs’ claims and allegations would be suitable for class action status.” Apple is settling to avoid further costs of litigation.
If the settlement receives final approval by the court, all current or former owners or purchasers of a Siri device in the United States whose confidential or private communications were obtained by Apple between September 17, 2014 and December 31, 2024 will be considered class members and could be eligible for a payment.
A settlement website will be set up to identify those eligible to participate within 45 days. Apple will be required to share contact information for customers who purchased a device with Siri capabilities. Claims can be submitted until May 15, 2025, after which time the settlement will be finalized and payments will go out to eligible customers. Each class member will be allowed to submit claims for up to five Siri-capable devices, receiving up to $20 for each one. As usual, the actual settlement payment will depend on the total number of valid claims that are submitted, so the amount per device could prove to be well under $20. We’ll keep you posted when we learn more.
