In perhaps one of the more ridiculous lawsuits Apple has been involved in, the company is being sued over the size of its latest mobile operating system, iOS 8.
The suit argues that while Apple does state how large the operating system will be once it is installed, the company has made it to be large, reducing the amount of usable memory on an iPhone and forcing users to purchase extra iCloud storage.
"Apple's misrepresentations and omissions are deceptive and misleading because they omit material facts that an average consumer would consider in deciding whether to purchase its products," says the complaint. "Rather ironically, Apple touts iOS 8 as 'The biggest iOS release ever.' Of course, Apple is not referring to the literal size of iOS 8, which appears to be entirely undisclosed in its voluminous marketing materials extolling the purported virtues of iOS 8."
The lawsuit specifically targets devices with only 16 GB of memory, and seeks class action status on behalf of others who purchased 16 GB devices. It also, however, accuses Apple of not working with third-party cloud storage providers to allow users to upload their files to those providers.
"Using these sharp business tactics, [Apple] gives less storage capacity than advertised, only to offer to sell that capacity in a desperate moment, e.g., when a consumer is trying to record or take photos at a child or grandchild's recital, basketball game or wedding," continues the suit. "To put this in context, each gigabyte of storage Apple shortchanges its customers amounts to approximately 400-500 high-resolution photographs."
Apple has not responded to the lawsuit, but it is likely that it won't be long before it is dismissed from the court. This is not the first time that the company has been accused of misleading users about storage. In 2007, iPod Nano users filed a lawsuit against the company for advertising that devices had 8 GB of storage when they only had 7.45 GB. The case was ultimately dismissed.
It is highly likely that this case won't get very far, especially considering the fact that other cloud storage options are available to users.
In 2012, Microsoft was sued for falsely advertising the storage on the Surface Pro tablets. The tablets were running a more storage-hungry Windows, essentially meaning that less than half of the 32 GB advertised was available for the user.
The Apple lawsuit is seeking a whopping $5 million in damages, saying that devices lose between 18.1 percent and 23.1 percent of their onboard storage. The two plaintiffs in the case, which was filed in U.S. District Court in the Northern District in California, are Miami residents Paul Orshan and Christopher Endara. The case was assigned to Magistrate Judge Nathanael M. Cousins.
