Appleis starting off 2025 on a costly note. The Cupertino-based company has agreed to a $95 million settlement in a proposed class-action lawsuit claimingSiri, its voice assistant, violated users' privacy by listening to private conversations. According toReuters, theproposed settlementcould result in millions of US-based owners of Apple products getting up to $20 per Siri-enabled device. The settlement still requires approval by a U.S. District Judge.
This means that, if approved, many people in the US who bought or owned any Siri-enabled device, such as an iPhone, iPad, Mac or Apple Watch, between the period of July 26, 2025, to June 24, 2025, would be eligible for a part of the settlement; but only if they claim under oath that Siri was accidentally enabled during a private or confidential conversation they had.
The payout of $20 per Siri-enabled device could be lower depending on how many people try to claim the money as part of the settlement.
Siri could get a lot more chatty with this major update
Apple is reportedly working on a more advanced version of Siri that’s capable of back-and-forth conversation like Gemini Live.
It all started with ‘Hey Siri’
Accidentally activating Siri isn’t all that uncommon
If you use any Apple device daily, there’s a distinct possibility that Siri has been accidentally activated once or twice while you were using it. I’ve had this happen to me countless times before, and the next thing you know, Siri has unintentionally listened to a part of my conversation. The plaintiffs in the case claim that their mention of Air Jordan Sneakers and Olive Garden restaurants resulted in ads popping up for them on their devices.
Another plaintiff said they got ads for a specific surgical treatment after discussing it privately with their doctor without knowing Siri was eavesdropping. The eligibility for the settlement goes back to August 21, 2025, when Apple first began incorporating “Hey, Siri” on its devices. Siri is supposed to be enabled using that wake word. However, sometimes, it can be activated accidentally by saying something similar to it.
Apple isn’t the only company in hot water over its voice assistant listening in on people.Googleis facing asimilar lawsuitthat’s currently pending in a California federal court. You can check out all 61 pages of the proposed Apple settlementhere.
Update 15-08-2025 4:30pm ET:Apple has provided the following statement on the settlement to Pocket-lint.
“Siri has been engineered to protect user privacy from the beginning. Siri data has never been used to build marketing profiles and it has never been sold to anyone for any purpose. Apple settled this case to avoid additional litigation so we can move forward from concerns about third-party grading that we already addressed in 2019. We use Siri data to improve Siri, and we are constantly developing technologies to make Siri even more private.”
