How To Claim Your Payout Of Apple's $95 Million Siri Spying Settlement
It took several years, but there's finally a proposed resolution for a privacy fumble related to Siri that prompted a rare apology from Apple back in 2019. As part of the proposed settlement, Apple would dole out $95 million in collective funds to past and present Siri device owners, though there is a deadline that is fast approaching to file a claim for your stake.
So what is this about? Back in 2019, a bombshell report by The Guardian revealed that Apple had commissioned third-party contractors to listen to conversations people were having with Siri, in an effort to improve the digital assistant's capabilities. But those recordings were sometimes of private and sensitive discussions, as well as times that users did not know Siri was listening.
Revelation of Siri's privacy shortcomings came by way of a whistleblower, who stated that contractors had encountered "countless instances of recordings featuring private discussions between doctors and patients, business dealings, seemingly criminal dealings, sexual encounters, and so on." At the time, it was said that contractors in Ireland were listening to as many as 1,000 Siri recordings per day.
"We know that customers have been concerned by recent reports of people listening to audio Siri recordings as part of our Siri quality evaluation process—which we call grading. We heard their concerns, immediately suspended human grading of Siri requests and began a thorough review of our practices and policies.[...]As a result of our review, we realize we haven’t been fully living up to our high ideals, and for that we apologize. As we previously announced, we halted the Siri grading program," Apple wrote at the time.
The class action lawsuit in the case of Lopez v. Apple Inc. potentially puts the matter to rest, for those who are eligible and choose to participate. Apple has agreed to the $95 million settlement. Anyone who owned or purchased a Siri-enabled device and experienced an unintended Siri activation during a confidential or private communication between September 17, 2014 and December 31, 2024 can participate, if desired.
"Settlement Class Members who submit valid claims shall receive a pro rata portion of the Net Settlement Amount for a Class Payment of up to a cap of $20 per Siri Device. The amount available to Settlement Class Members will increase or decrease pro rata depending on the total number of valid claims submitted, and Siri Devices claimed," a settlement notice states.
This includes not only iPhone devices, but any Siri-enabled device, including iPads, Apple Watches, MacBooks, iMacs, HomePods, iPods touches, and Apple TV hardware.
You may have received an email (check your spam folder) or postcard with a Claim Identification Code and a Confirmation Code related to the settlement. If so, use those when filing a claim. If you didn't but still feel you're eligible, you can still stake a claim—read the settlement notice and if you decide to participate, fill out the claim form.
