Apple Siri Privacy Lawsuit: The $95 Million Eavesdropping Settlement

What the Lawsuit Alleged

In Lopez v. Apple, filed in 2019, plaintiffs alleged that Siri — the voice assistant on iPhones and other Apple devices — recorded private conversations even when users had not said “Hey Siri” or pressed a button to activate it. The suit claimed that some of those inadvertent recordings were reviewed by contractors and that data was used to target advertising, fueling the widely held suspicion that phones “listen” to conversations.

Apple denied wrongdoing throughout, and the alleged advertising link in particular was contested.

The Settlement

Apple agreed to a $95 million settlement, which a federal judge approved in January 2025. Tens of millions of people who owned a Siri-enabled Apple device over a defined period (roughly late 2014 onward) could file claims for up to $20 per device, subject to limits. Apple also agreed to confirm it had deleted certain older Siri recordings and to make user choices about voice-data retention clearer.

For its part, Apple had already changed its practices earlier — making human review of Siri recordings opt-in — after the original reports surfaced.

What Users Should Know

Whatever one makes of the “phones are listening” debate, you can review Siri and dictation settings on your device, opt out of sharing audio recordings to improve Siri, and delete Siri history. Any settlement claim is verified only through the official administrator, not a third-party site.