Apple to pay $95m to settle Siri ‘listening’ lawsuit

Apple has agreed to pay $95 million (£77 million) to settle a lawsuit that accused some of its devices of listening to people without their consent.

The tech company was charged with spying on customers via its virtual assistant, Siri.

The plaintiffs also claim that voice recordings were shared with advertisers.

Apple, which has not acknowledged any wrongdoing, has been contacted for comment.

Apple’s lawyers also say they will confirm they have “permanently deleted individual Siri audio recordings collected by Apple prior to October 2019”.

But the claimants say the tech firm recorded people who activated the virtual assistant unintentionally – without using the phrase “Hey, Siri” to wake it.

They say advertisers who received the recordings could then look for keywords in them to better target ads.

The lead plaintiff Fumiko Lopez claims she and her daughter were both recorded without their consent.

If they are successful, the money won is paid out across all claimants.

According to the court documents, each claimant – who has to be based in the US -could be paid up to $20 per Siri-enabled device they owned between 2014 and 2019.

In this case, the lawyers could take 30% of the fee plus expenses – which comes to just under $30m.

By settling, Apple not only denies wrongdoing, but it also avoids the risk of facing a court case which could potentially mean a much larger pay out.

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