Apple sued for allegedly forcing users to buy new iPhone chargers

by Michael Heller / Feb 05, 2019, 1:36 PM

Apple sued for allegedly forcing users to buy new iPhone chargers

If you've ever had an issue where an iOS update caused your iPhone to stop accepting its original charger, then there's a lawsuit in the works that should be of note. On Monday, a lawsuit was filed in California against Apple alleging that the company forced users to purchase new iPhone chargers by pushing updates that broke compatibility with older chargers.

According to the lawsuit, there have been thousands of iPhone users who could not use their chargers after an iOS update because they began to receive error messages that stated ""this accessory may not be supported." The claim is that Apple knowingly and purposefully broke compatibility with those chargers in order to force users to purchase new ones. The issues were specifically tied to an iOS update in November 2016, which would appear to be iOS 10.1.1, although that was not explicitly stated in the court filing.

The Class Members were not informed by Apple Inc. of this plan to program a rejection of old iPhone chargers. Apple Inc.’s goal was to program the iPhone, after their sale to Class Members, so that said iPhones would no longer accept their chargers. This forced Plaintiff and Class Members to be forced to either purchase new iPhones or new chargers, which cost approximately twice as much, in order for Apple Inc. to greatly increase its profits to the detriment of Class Members.

Now, if you've been a long time reader here, you might realize there are a couple major flaw with the argument presented in the lawsuit: it's fairly unlikely that something like this could have happened more than two years ago without A) us hearing about it before, or B) it affecting significantly more than "thousands" of users. Estimates at the time said there were somewhere around 725 million iPhones in the wild as of the end of 2016, so if Apple had programmed the rejection of old iPhone chargers as the suit claims, it's hard to imagine a change like that affecting such a small portion of the ecosystem.

If we were to use Occam's Razor here, it would seem more likely that those thousands of users coincidentally saw that error message around the same time and incorrectly attributed it to an iOS update rather than other causes, such as damaged or dirty chargers or charging ports. With an ecosystem that big, it wouldn't be a stretch to think that .0007 percent (assuming 5,000 affected users) of iPhone users happened to have the same issue around the same time.

source: Lawsuit via MacRumors

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20 Comments

1. p51d007

Posts: 694; Member since: Nov 24, 2013

Duh! That's what Apple does. Slows the OS down on older phones if it "thinks" your battery is not as good, so everything runs slower, you run to the Apple store, only to be told you need to shell out money on a new phone. Overpriced chargers, cables, ear buds, chargers...it's the cult of Apple.

posted on Feb 05, 2019, 1:44 PM 28

3. Vokilam

Posts: 935; Member since: Mar 15, 2018

Did you even read the article?

posted on Feb 05, 2019, 1:51 PM 7

6. Finalflash

Posts: 4052; Member since: Jul 23, 2013

It's a forced upgrade tactic as usual. Get the person thinking about having to buy an updated item which comes with, you guessed it, an iPhone. Make them think that the products from that time are outdated to get them to upgrade all at once.

posted on Feb 05, 2019, 2:10 PM 14

2. almostdone

Posts: 409; Member since: Sep 25, 2012

Rotten fruit.

posted on Feb 05, 2019, 1:47 PM 10

4. monkeyb

Posts: 342; Member since: Jan 17, 2018

I have read a similar article few hours back elsewhere and there is one very important piece of information missing here: - There is no talk about the lightning cable that is being used. I have used dozens of 3rd party charging bricks since many years and never had a problem once. But if I purchased a 3rd party lightning cable that is claimed to be MFI authorized by a sneaky company in amazon, my phone used to give me the error "at times" I am sure half the haters in this site will not read the article and will not bother to know the difference between a charging brick or adapter (mentioned in this lawsuit) and a MFI Lightning cable. Apple makes by money by giving cheap sh*t lightning cables that break easy but not by this nonsense.

posted on Feb 05, 2019, 2:01 PM 3

5. rouyal

Posts: 1540; Member since: Jan 05, 2018

Makes no sense. Sounds like its under the assumption that Apple will only let it’s devices charge through an official charger. I didn’t even think an iOS device (or even any phone besides OnePlus and their dash charge) can even tell what charger is giving the power, only that it is giving a charge.

posted on Feb 05, 2019, 2:05 PM 0

16. L0n3n1nja

Posts: 1499; Member since: Jul 12, 2016

Few years back an iOS update blocked support for some of the 3rd party chargers we sold at the Verizon I worked for. I think it was when the 5S launched and the version of iOS that came with it.

posted on Feb 05, 2019, 11:03 PM 0

7. lyndon420

Posts: 6275; Member since: Jul 11, 2012

I don't know. Many iOS users probably wouldn't cast apple in a bad light... they'd just buy a new charger and be done with it.

posted on Feb 05, 2019, 2:10 PM 3

12. scarface21173

Posts: 584; Member since: Aug 17, 2014

Or a new phone

posted on Feb 05, 2019, 3:35 PM 2

9. antroid

Posts: 357; Member since: Jan 24, 2018

I assume the next thing will be telling the people to buy Apple certified cases because only with them you could have a good reception.

posted on Feb 05, 2019, 2:57 PM 4

10. srgonu

Posts: 484; Member since: Feb 13, 2012

I saw this coming...

posted on Feb 05, 2019, 3:11 PM 0

11. Xxtoxicskittlexx

Posts: 119; Member since: Jun 11, 2018

You were just dying to use "Occams Razor" somewhere today huh? What problem did you solve exactly ?

posted on Feb 05, 2019, 3:26 PM 0

13. harrycool

Posts: 6; Member since: Jan 11, 2018

Had this unsupported accessory issue several times with my wife's iPhone 7 plus with bundled charger and cable that too during the first year of purchasing the phone. Until the charger finally stopped working. Since then she uses my old sony or lenovo charger and everything works fine.

posted on Feb 05, 2019, 3:41 PM 0

18. Leo_MC

Posts: 5914; Member since: Dec 02, 2011

Didn’t Apple change it under warranty?

posted on Feb 06, 2019, 1:49 AM 0

14. w159148

Posts: 19; Member since: Jan 02, 2018

I am not really sure about this but I think Apple-branded cables and charges have different circuitry in them compared to other normal chargers. It's there to prevent over-voltage and maybe for security reasons? I don't know much about it.

posted on Feb 05, 2019, 4:17 PM 0

15. NarutoKage14

Posts: 1261; Member since: Aug 31, 2016

I actually experienced this back in the day on an iPod video and the 2 subsequent touch models. I had a couple of chargers that were rejected after iOS updates. Coincidentally 2 of those iPods kept deleting my non iTunes purchased songs among other faults.

posted on Feb 05, 2019, 4:41 PM 0

17. SIGPRO

Posts: 2806; Member since: Oct 03, 2012

This also happened for years in Europe, every manufacturer had their own chargers and a new phone meant new charger. Few years back European Union decided that all manufacturers must have USB. It is mandatory to have at least USBC from 2019. Fruit company says they care about the environment, this is complete BS! Because they want you to upgrade everytime and make you buy cables and dongles! If all manufacturers made only a few models every 2 years than it would be way better for the environment. Now some companies release new phones every few months.