Apple has clarified its stance on Siri’s privacy practices following a $95 million settlement in a class action lawsuit that accused the company of recording private conversations after unintentional activations of its voice assistant. The lawsuit alleged that these conversations were then shared with third parties, including advertisers.
Apple denied the claims, stating that it has never sold or used Siri data to build marketing profiles. The company emphasized that no data was shared for advertising purposes, and no audio recordings were retained unless users explicitly consented to improve Siri’s performance. As part of the settlement, Apple agreed to pay up to $20 per device to affected users of Siri-enabled devices like iPhones and Apple Watches.
The company clarified that certain Siri features do require real-time data input from Apple servers to function correctly, but it uses the minimum amount of data necessary. Apple also reiterated its commitment to enhancing privacy features for Siri in the future.
This settlement comes amid ongoing legal scrutiny, including a similar lawsuit involving Google’s Voice Assistant, which is currently pending in federal court in California.