Complaint against Apple for listening to Siri conversations

A whistleblower has testified against Apple. He had to listen to more than 46,000 recordings, some of which were without the Siri users' knowledge. A complaint has been filed in France by the Human Rights League.

On the programme "À bon entendeur" on RTS (French-speaking Swiss television) this Tuesday, 18 March 2025, the testimony of Thomas le Bonniec, a former employee of an Apple's subcontractor in Cork, Ireland, highlighted an intrusive practice with Siri. His job was to listen to 1,300 conversations of virtual assistant users per day in order to check Siri's response quality, rate it, and correct the transcription if necessary. He was thus able to hear 46,000 recordings, averaging 20 to 30 seconds, of requests, some from children or sick people inquiring about their condition. There were also political opinions. An entry into people's private lives without their explicit consent.

Violation of the law

These facts took place in 2019. The whistleblower – now benefiting from this status – had made screenshots before resigning. According to these clues, millions of recordings in at least a dozen countries were used by Apple. His colleagues or those of its subcontractors thus had access to private aspects of millions of people's lives without their consent. In August 2019, Apple stopped the human rating system for Siri. Since then, the samples concern only 0.2% of requests submitted to the voice assistant, which come from customers who have chosen to participate in "the improvement of Siri". Nevertheless, the French justice system was seized in February 2025 following a complaint against Apple by the Human Rights League for "privacy violation".

(MH with Olivier Duquesne – Source: RTS – Picture: © Unsplash)