Buried Apple Privacy Scandal Undermines Its Attacks On Right To Repair Legislation

Apple has never looked kindly upon users actually repairing their own devices. The company's ham-fisted efforts to shut down, sue, or otherwise imperil third-party repair shops are legendary. As are the company's efforts to force recycling shops to shred Apple products (so they can't be refurbished and re-used). As is Apple's often comical attacks on essential right to repair legislation, which usually involves the company insisting that allowing broader independent and consumer repair of their devices would be a security and privacy nightmare.

Yeah, about that. Apple last week was revealed to have paid a multi-million dollar settlement to an Oregon woman after iPhone repair technicians uploaded explicit images and videos to the internet from a phone that she sent in for repair. In this case, the culprits were employed by one of Apple's "authorized" repair contractors, Pegatron Technology Service in California. These authorized techs then uploaded the woman's private conversations and photos to the internet, making it look as if she had done it:

"The videos were uploaded to appear as though the woman herself had shared them on purpose, according to the documents, causing the woman “severe emotional distress”. The woman was made aware of the incident when friends saw the videos and images on Facebook. The woman sued Apple and eventually settled with the company for a multi-million dollar sum. But Apple was never directly named in the lawsuit in an effort to keep the matter confidential."

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