Three More Law Firms Join Class Action Lawsuit Against Apple Over iPhone 6 'Touch Disease'

Three additional law firms have joined a class action lawsuit against Apple over an alleged defect that causes iPhone 6 Plus touchscreens to become unresponsive and fail.

Back in August, reports began appearing from iPhone 6 owners describing an apparently latent manufacturing issue that causes a flickering bar to appear at the top of the screen and the display to become unresponsive or less responsive to touch.


A week later, three iPhone 6 owners filed a complaint with the U.S. District Court of Northern California after their devices presented symptoms of the problem – dubbed "touch disease" by repair website iFixit – which Apple has yet to publicly acknowledge.

Yesterday, Motherboard reported that lawyers who filed the class action complaint earlier this fall have now signed on three additional law firms to support their case, while an additional class action lawsuit related to the issue has been filed against Apple in Utah.

Richard McCune, an attorney in the California case, said he has been contacted by 10,000 people asking to join the suit, which accuses Apple of violating the state's consumer fraud statutes, negligent misrepresentation, breach of implied warranty, unjust enrichment, and other consumer act violations.

The "touch disease" flaw is thought to be caused by the touchscreen controller chips soldered to the iPhone's logic board losing contact after a period of normal usage, because of Apple's failure to incorporate a metal shield. So far, Apple has refused to repair the out-of-warranty iPhones without charge when the defect manifests. Worse, replacement refurbished handsets costing owners $329 have reportedly shown symptoms of the same problem within days or weeks of being issued.

iPhone-5s-metal-shield
Motherboard claims five separate current and former Apple Geniuses have confirmed that Apple is aware of the problem but will not tell customers about it.

However, Apple's filed response to the most recent Utah complaint appears at least to signal a legal acknowledgement of the issue and the company's lawyers have requested an "extension of time to respond to the Complaint" and asked that the Utah and California cases be combined into one.

Given the similarity between the [Utah] and [California] actions, it would unnecessarily tax judicial resources if these actions were to proceed in separate class action lawsuits—especially where the [Utah] and [California] Plaintiffs purport to represent the same putative class of all consumers who purchased an iPhone 6 or 6 Plus.

On Friday, McCune filed an updated lawsuit against Apple that includes several new plaintiffs and formally adds the three separate law firms to the legal battle. "Each of the firms (who had their own clients) brings strength to the case, including Stephen Larson of Larson O'Brien, who is a former Federal Judge," McCune told Motherboard. "With these firms working with us, we believe it gives us the best chance of obtaining a positive result in the case for the owners of the phones."

Related Forum: iPhone

Top Rated Comments

MH01 Avatar
98 months ago
This will lead to a repair program. People who experience this in the future will appreciate the efforts of those pushing apple at the moment to acknowledge the issue and take action. This is a rinse and repeat of previous issues like the nvidia GPUs in MacBooks
Score: 45 Votes (Like | Disagree)
macjunk(ie) Avatar
98 months ago
Apple vs Samsung...Choose your poison.
Both companies are stubborn...refusing to accept design flaws in their product...come what may. Such a shame!
Score: 30 Votes (Like | Disagree)
JungleNYC Avatar
98 months ago
Well I doubt this was worth the 0.4mm or whatever thickness savings it was to drop the metal shield. I'm sure some will think it was. Hopefully this will result in less short-sightedness in the future regarding the subject.
Exactly.

I've certainly rolled my eyes in the past over the previous class action suits (you're holding it wrong, etc) but this one feels legit. I know several people who's phones are suffering from this, mine included. And when the marketplace can organize to protect itself, it's a good thing.

I keep a nice, clean, phone, and never-ever even dropped my 6 (got lucky this round). And this started happening to me in August…out of warranty, and just in time for the 7, even though I would've waited till next year had the phone kept working properly. Now, that wasn't terrible…just inconvenient, and expensive…but the other issue is that this "touch disease" renders my 6 un-sellable, so I can't recoup any $$$ to offset the purchase of the new 7.

Again, lawyers and class actions can certainly be skeevy, but they generally serve a purpose. And sometimes (perhaps in this case) they will do what they are designed to do: 1) hold companies accountable for bad decisions and make them think twice in the future, and 2) giving consumers a bit of relief without them having to spend their own time and effort to pursue an individual resolution.
Score: 22 Votes (Like | Disagree)
Samford Avatar
98 months ago
Greedy Apple vs Horny Suers.
Really just shows how poor consumer laws are in the USA that you have to resort to lawyers.
Apple know they won't get away with this smoke screen in Australia.
Score: 15 Votes (Like | Disagree)
sracer Avatar
98 months ago
Lawyers aren't always awesome, and class actions can be flawed, but I would much rather the private sector police itself than give yet more power and money to the government bureaucracy.
Sounds good in theory, but in practice... not so much.

Should Apple come out and admit that the problem exists, they'll claim that "only a handful of people" are affected. They'll most likely set up a replacement program for those affected. "affected" as in , "bring the phone in to an Apple store and if it fails some predetermined test then it will be replaced, but if to doesn't, too bad". The replacement unit will have the same flaws and will eventually fail at some later point (AFTER the expiration date of the program).

There are way too many units out in the field to man-up and declare a recall. Apple will set up the replacement program, people will rejoice over Apple "doing the right thing", damage control complete. The losers will be those who have phones that fail after the expiration date (or whose replacement phones fail again). And some will say, "well, 2-3 years is long enough lifespan for a flagship phone."
Score: 14 Votes (Like | Disagree)
skinned66 Avatar
98 months ago
Well I doubt this was worth the 0.4mm or whatever thickness savings it was to drop the metal shield. I'm sure some will think it was. Hopefully this will result in less short-sightedness in the future regarding the subject.
Score: 11 Votes (Like | Disagree)

Popular Stories

reset password request iphone

Warning: Apple Users Targeted in Phishing Attack Involving Rapid Password Reset Requests

Tuesday March 26, 2024 4:34 pm PDT by
Phishing attacks taking advantage of Apple's password reset feature have become increasingly common, according to a report from KrebsOnSecurity. Multiple Apple users have been targeted in an attack that bombards them with an endless stream of notifications or multi-factor authentication (MFA) messages in an attempt to cause panic so they'll respond favorably to social engineering. An...
maxresdefault

Apple to Launch New iPad Pro and iPad Air Models in May

Thursday March 28, 2024 11:07 am PDT by
Apple will introduce new iPad Pro and iPad Air models in early May, according to Bloomberg's Mark Gurman. Gurman previously suggested the new iPads would come out in March, and then April, but the timeline has been pushed back once again. Subscribe to the MacRumors YouTube channel for more videos. Apple is working on updates to both the iPad Pro and iPad Air models. The iPad Pro models will...
Generic iOS 18 Feature Purple

iOS 18: What to Expect From 'Biggest' Update in iPhone's History

Wednesday March 27, 2024 11:10 am PDT by
At least some Apple software engineers continue to believe that iOS 18 will be the "biggest" update in the iPhone's history, according to Bloomberg's Mark Gurman. Below, we recap rumored features and changes for the iPhone. "The iOS 18 update is expected to be the most ambitious overhaul of the iPhone's software in its history, according to people working on the upgrade," wrote Gurman, in a r...
maxresdefault

Apple Announces WWDC 2024 Event for June 10 to 14

Tuesday March 26, 2024 10:02 am PDT by
Apple today announced that its 35th annual Worldwide Developers Conference is set to take place from Monday, June 10 to Friday, June 14. As with WWDC events since 2020, WWDC 2024 will be an online event that is open to all developers at no cost. Subscribe to the MacRumors YouTube channel for more videos. WWDC 2024 will include online sessions and labs so that developers can learn about new...
apple maps 3d feature

Apple Maps May Gain Custom Routes With iOS 18

Tuesday March 26, 2024 3:10 pm PDT by
Apple may be planning to add support for "custom routes" in Apple Maps in iOS 18, according to code reviewed by MacRumors. Apple Maps does not currently offer a way to input self-selected routes, with Maps users limited to Apple's pre-selected options, but that may change in iOS 18. Apple has pushed an iOS 18 file to its maps backend labeled "CustomRouteCreation." While not much is revealed...
General iOS 17 Feature Orange Purple

Apple Releases Revised Versions of iOS 17.4.1 and iPadOS 17.4.1 With Updated Build Number

Wednesday March 27, 2024 5:59 am PDT by
Apple on late Tuesday released revised versions of iOS 17.4.1 and iPadOS 17.4.1 with an updated build number of 21E237, according to MacRumors contributor Aaron Perris. The updates previously had a build number of 21E236. The revised updates are available for all iPhone and iPad models that are compatible with iOS 17 and iPadOS 17, but they can only be installed via the Finder app on macOS...
applephilschiller

Apple's Phil Schiller Works 80 Hours a Week Overseeing App Store

Wednesday March 27, 2024 2:03 pm PDT by
With the App Store and app ecosystem undergoing major changes in the European Union, The Wall Street Journal today shared a profile on App Store chief Phil Schiller, who is responsible for the App Store. Though Schiller transitioned from marketing chief to "Apple Fellow" in 2020 to take a step back from Apple and spend more time on personal projects and friends, he is reportedly working...