Apple sued over iPhone 3G cracks

American takes fight to court

17 November 2008 11:40 GMT / By Katie Scott

A lawsuit has been filed against Apple in a New York district court.

The complainant is Nassau County resident Avi Koschitzki who claims that Apple is ignoring hairline cracks that he claims will form in the handset's enclosure.

"Although Apple was and is aware that the iPhones were and are defective, and that consumers have experienced repeated instances of cracked housing, Apple has nevertheless allowed the defectively designed iPhones to be sold to the public", the complaint says.

Koschitzki has also joined four other disgruntled customers claiming that Apple and US carrier AT&T misrepresented the performance of the new touchscreen handset by advertising it as "twice as fast" as its predecessor.

In his complaint, Koschitzki claims: "Based upon information and belief the 3G iPhones demand too much power from the 3G bandwidths and the AT&T infrastructure is insufficient to handle this overwhelming 3G signal based on the high volume of 3G iPhones it and Apple have sold".

The 3G network is now overloaded, he claims, and therefore iPhone 3G owners frequently get bumped off onto the slower EDGE network.

Koschitzki has also stated that he is unhappy with the handful of iPhone Software updates released to date.

The complaint also names AT&T as a defendant.