Class action lawsuit pertaining to an iPhone 6 Plus hardware flaw, referred to as “Touch Disease,” has gained support from three additional law firms.
Motherboard reports that lawyers who filed the original class action complaint have now signed on three additional law firms to support their case.
An additional “Touch Disease” class action suit has been filed against Apple in Utah and there is also a similar class action suit in Canada.
Back in August, web reports backed by analysis from iFixit alleged that some iPhone 6 owners were seeing a flickering bar at the top of the screen while their device’s touchscreen display became unresponsive.
iFixit attributed the issue to a hardware defect.
Apple has not responded to the issue and customers who have contacted the company about it were allegedly instructed to buy new phones.
Replacing the display does not fix the underlying issue because it’s caused by a pair of touch controller chips coming loose from the phone’s logic board.
Apple does not perform logic board repairs for consumers and has instead replaced touch diseased iPhone 6 Pluses with $329 refurbished ones, “some of which are showing symptoms of touch disease within days or weeks of being replaced.”
“The flaw is believed to be related to the phone’s larger form factor and unreinforced logic board, which can cause it to flex or bend even under normal use—you may remember Bendgate from when the phone was first released,” explains Motherboard.
We at least know that Apple is aware of these class action suits.
In a September 20 filing in the Utah case, Apple wrote that it has requested an “extension of time to respond to the Complaint.” The company has since requested that the separate “Touch Disease” class action suits be merged 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,” wrote Apple’s lawyers.
One attorney in the California case has been contacted by a whopping 10,000 people asking to join the suit. Motherboard claims that “five separate current and former Apple Geniuses have confirmed” to them that the Cupertino firm is actually aware of the problem, but “won’t tell customers about it”.
For how much longer can Apple get away with pretending like “Touch Disease” doesn’t exist, do you think?
Source: Motherboard