Apple agrees to $500 million settlement for throttling older iPhones

[PoliticAverse]

Apple has tentatively agreed to a $500 million settlement after admitting to slowing down older phones. The deal would provide small payouts for many iPhone owners in the US, plus greater compensation for named class members and attorneys. It covers people who bought any product in the iPhone 6 and 7 lineup — which Apple secretly throttled to conserve battery life.

As Bloomberg Law notes, the settlement was filed in a California court last Friday and is awaiting final court approval. The deal — which took months to negotiate — would resolve dozens of class action lawsuits that were filed between 2017 and 2018, then later consolidated into one complaint.
"Apple will pay between $310 million and $500 million"

By default, Apple will offer $25 to any current or former owner of a covered iPhone. Named class members will receive $1,500 or $3,500, and around $90 million will go toward attorneys. The settlement has a minimum payout of $310 million, so the payment might increase if few people file claims. Conversely, if payments exceed the $500 million cap, each iPhone owner will receive less money.

Read the rest at: https://www.theverge.com/2020/3/2/21161271/apple-settlement-500-million-throttling-batterygate-class-action-lawsuit

[CloudWatcher]

2. pretty crazy really

Re "slowing down older phones" ... this was an engineering fix to keep the phone from crashing when an aging battery couldn't deliver enough juice for peak demand. The problem here was lack of communication (to customers and sales) about what was happening. It wasn't an evil plot by marketing to sell more phones.

So ... "secretly throttled to conserve battery life" is just not true. They slowed it down to keep it from crashing and then Apple dropped the ball and forgot to tell people about the fix.

Note they *still* slow down older phones, it's just now there is a display [Battery in the Settings app] that tells you about it.