Apple And Samsung Fined For 'Deliberately Slowing Down Phones'

Italian authorities have fined Apple and Samsung for pushing the latest software updates that led to device malfunctions, and ultimately forced users to buy new phones.

Back in January this year, Italy’s antitrust organization conducted separate investigations on Apple and Samsung to find if they were deliberately using software updates to slow down phones.

Now the committee has issued a statement claiming both companies have violated consumer codes and are subjected to penalties for the same.

Apple has been slapped with a €5 million fine ($5.7 million) for several issues in iPhone 6 that cropped up when users installed iOS 10 — which was developed for iPhone 7.

Since the new iOS consumed more energy, those with older iPhones and weaker batters experienced unexpected shutdowns.

The company also released a fix for the same through 10.2.1 update. But it didn’t warn users that the fix would throttle CPUs and batteries on older devices to prevent these random shutdowns.

Apple has been with a second €5 million fine for not providing any information to customers about their device’s battery capacity, average lifespan or instructions on how to maintain or replace them.

Meanwhile, Samsung is also being fined a €5 million fine ($5.7 million) for rolling out the Marshmallow 6.0.1 update (developed for Galaxy Note 7) on Note 4.

The firmware was too demanding for the phone which led malfunction in several cases. It also forced people to pay high repair costs out of their pocket as Note 4 was two years older by then, hence out of warranty.

In response, Samsung has said that it is planning to appeal the decision and expressed disappointment at the committee’s decision whereas Apple has refused to comment.