As a result of a very long investigation, the Italian Competition Authority AGCM fined Samsung 5 million and Apple 10 million euros for contested practices.
According to ACGM, both the companies released firmware updates for mobile phones that cause serious malfunctions and slows down the old mobile phones, which forces users in replacing them.
Both the companies 5 million euros (about $5.7 million) for releasing updates that reduce the smartphone functionality and Apple was fined with an additional 5 million euros providing adequate information in restoring functionality of products.
These two companies induced to install updates on the devices that are not able to adequately supported, without providing adequate information, or no means of restoring the original functionality of the products.
“Samsung has insistently proposed, from May 2016, to consumers who had purchased a Galaxy Not 4 (placed on the market in September 2014) to proceed to install the new Android firmware called Marshmallow prepared for the new phone model Note 7, without to inform of serious malfunctions due to the greater stresses of the hardware and requiring a high repair cost for out-of-warranty repairs connected to such malfunctions. reads ACGM investigation report.”
“Apple has insistently proposed, from September 2016, to the owners of various models of iPhone 6 (6 / 6Plus and 6s / 6sPlus respectively placed on the market in the autumn of 2014 and 2015), to install the new operating system iOS 10 developed for the new iPhone7, without informing the greater energy demands of the new operating system and the possible inconveniences – such as sudden shutdowns – that such installation could have entailed.
To limit these issues, Apple released a new update (iOS 10.2.1) in February 2017, without warning that its installation could reduce the speed of response and functionality of the devices.”
Apple apologized for slowing down phone’s performance of older iPhone models without users’ consent.
Samsung denied it, saying the company not provided any software update that reduced the Galaxy Note 4’s performance.
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