French Siri Spying Lawsuit
The investigation, led by the country’s cybercrime agency OFAC, follows a complaint in February by the French NGO Ligue des droits de l’Homme, based on the testimony of a whistleblower and former employee of an Apple subcontractor Thomas Le Bonniec.
As an employee of Globe Technical Services in Ireland in 2019, Le Bonniec analyzed recordings made by Siri to improve the quality of the voice assistant’s responses. That involved listening to thousands of user recordings, which Le Bonniec said could reveal intimate moments and confidential information, and could be used to identify users.
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The February complaint also paved the way for an ongoing class action in France. That was inspired by a class action in the United States, which saw Apple accused of recording private conversations without consumers’ knowledge. Apple agreed in December 2024 to settle the case for $95 million. The company denied any wrongdoing.
Via John Gruber:
Sending recorded Siri voice interactions to Apple is opt-in, and the opt-in screen is very clear and cogent.
That’s the case today, but it seems like this investigation is based on the same time period as the American lawsuit. Back then, it was not clear to customers that the recordings were retained and used outside of Apple, and the generic iOS opt-out control did not affect Siri recordings. Apple later added a Siri-specific opt-out switch, and then made it opt-in. Here Apple’s response from January. I wish Apple had not settled the lawsuit then because it made them look like they had something to hide. Le Bonniec is called a whistleblower. Does he have any new information, or is the French lawsuit just piggybacking and trying to get its own settlement?
Previously:
- France Fines Apple Over App Tracking Transparency
- Apple Settles Siri Spying Lawsuit
- Keeping Your Data From Apple Is Harder Than Expected
- Siri Suggestions and Privacy
- “Lack of Action” on Siri Recordings
- Opting Out of Sharing Siri Audio Recordings
- Apple Contractors “Regularly Hear Confidential Details” on Siri Recordings
- Amazon Employees Review “Small Sample” of Alexa Audio
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Yes, Gruber is getting this one wrong: the French lawsuit is about early Siri supposedly recording users without their express consent, based on a French whistleblower’s reports. The lawsuit is coming surprisingly late to the party, but the wheels of justice are turning extremely slowly in France at the moment.
Whether or not the lawsuit has merit is another matter entirely, and whether the “cybercrime” unit should be involved is left as an exercise to the reader.
Thomas Le Bonniec apparently worked for one of the contractors that Apple hired to process the recordings. I assume the lawsuit will be based at least in part on the data he collected and on his own personal testimony. That probably constitutes “new information” as far as the French legal system is concerned as the case has, to my best knowledge, never been litigated in the country.
EU-level repercussions are unclear, but are not impossible, given that EU countries are often bound to consider the outcome of legal procedures in other member states, especially when it comes to privacy-related decisions. It all depends on the status of the decision and the frameworks under which it is reached — and there my limited knowledge stops.
iGeneration explains everything correctly and concisely: https://www.igen.fr/services/2025/10/ecoutes-indiscretes-de-siri-le-parquet-de-paris-ouvre-une-enquete-152601
