Apple clarified on Wednesday that it has never sold data collected by its Siri voice assistant or used it to create marketing profiles, following the settlement of a class action lawsuit that alleged such practices.
Last week, Apple agreed to pay $95 million to settle the lawsuit, which accused the company of recording private conversations after Siri was unintentionally activated and sharing these conversations with third parties, including advertisers.
The company denied the allegations, emphasizing that it has never used Siri data for advertising purposes or sold it to any third party. “Apple has never used Siri data to build marketing profiles, never made it available for advertising, and never sold it to anyone for any purpose,” Apple stated.
Despite the settlement, which may result in up to $20 per Siri-enabled device for tens of millions of customers, Apple reaffirmed that it only retains Siri interaction data if users explicitly opt in for improvement purposes. It also stressed that only minimal data is used to provide accurate results for certain features that require real-time input from Apple servers.
Apple’s clarification came after some interpreted the settlement as an admission of guilt. The company further assured users that it will continue working to enhance Siri’s privacy.
A similar lawsuit involving Google’s Voice Assistant is currently pending in a federal court in San Jose, California, with the same law firms representing the plaintiffs as in the Apple case.
Source: Reuters
