Apple apologises for purposely slowing down phones

Cupertino: Apple has apologised to customers for purposely slowing down the performance of older iPhone models, without first asking for their consent.

The apology comes in the light of the tech giant admitting to slowing down the iPhone 6, 6S, 7 and SE, either when their batteries are old, or are low on charge, in order to allegedly prevent abrupt shutdowns.

A statement on Apple’s website read: “We’ve been hearing feedback from our customers about the way we handle performance for iPhones with older batteries and how we have communicated that process. We know that some of you feel Apple has let you down.

“We apologise. There’s been a lot of misunderstanding about this issue, so we would like to clarify and let you know about some changes we’re making,” added the statement. “First and foremost, we have never – and would never – do anything to intentionally shorten the life of any Apple product, or degrade the user experience to drive customer upgrades.”

Apple also announced a US$50 (OMR 19) reduction in the cost of its replacement batteries, which means they will not cost only US$29 (OMR 11), instead of the standard US$79 (OMR 30.5). The same holds good for any software upgrades customers might need to undertake at Apple stores.

Apple attributed the problem with old batteries to the manner in which their lithium-ion cells delivered power in an uneven manner, thereby causing harm to internal phone components.

Apple was forced to apologise because trials conducted by research firm Primate Labs clearly showed an forced reduction in the iPhone’s performances, causing customers to file cases against the corporation.
Several users have said that replacing older batteries did cause the phone to return to its original performance.