Class Action Against Siri Given Green Light to Proceed

Earlier this month, a federal district court gave the go-ahead to a suit brought by plaintiffs claiming that Apple’s “Siri” recorded private conversations.

Class Action Against Siri Claims Privacy Violations

Using the federal Wiretap Act and California privacy law, a class-action suit has been brought by plaintiffs that claim that Apple’s digital assistant, “Siri” makes a practice out of recording consumer conversations.  Even though the plaintiffs admit that such activation of “Siri” is accidental, the suit still claims that the digital assistant’s recording of such conversations violates state and federal law.

Experts believe that the proliferation of installed-base smart speaker sales have also exacerbated the problem.  As of June 2021, smart speaker sales reached 126 million units, which is 20 million more units than four years ago.

Although consumers generally do have options to manage their recordings, these settings generally cannot be managed by voice through the same speakers and have to be accessed online via a traditional browser or through corresponding mobile applications.

While companies like Google and Apple state that they use recordings to improve their services, the plaintiffs believe there are much more nefarious uses.  When Amazon admitted in the past that they “manually” review such data, consumers had been up in arms.  While time will tell how the class action suit against Apple goes, separate, similar lawsuits have also been brought against Google and Amazon for their digital assistants as well. 

Key Takeaways on the Class Action Against Siri 

A federal district judge gave the go-ahead for a class action suit against Apple concerning “Siri” and its recordings of private conversations. The class action suit alleges:

• “Siri” routinely records private conversations;

• Apple’s recording of private conversations violates the federal Wiretap Act; and

• Violates California privacy laws as well.

For more information on data privacy, see our Intellectual Property Litigation and Industry Focused Legal Solutions pages.