A lawsuit alleging that Apple and AT&T secretly formed monopoly with their exclusive iPhone agreement has received class action status, meaning the plaintiffs now represent everybody who’s bought an iPhone in the United States, reports “Wired” (http://www.wired.com/gadgetlab/2010/07/iphone-class-action/).
Judge James Ware of the U.S. District court for the Northern District of California on Thursday granted class certification of plaintiffs’ antitrust claims seeking damages and injunctive relief for the complaint that was originally filed in 2007.
The class-action lawsuit alleges that Apple and AT&T had illegally exerted a monopoly by telling customers their iPhone contract was two years long when in actuality the companies’ exclusivity agreement was for an indefinite, undisclosed amount of time. That means even after iPhone customers’ two-year contracts have expired, they still don’t have the option of switching to another carrier because AT&T is still Apple’s only U.S. partner.