Apple is now facing an inevitable class action lawsuit over a flaw in iCloud Private Relay that exposes a user's identity. It's a lawsuit from the same firm that got a $250M settlement over Siri AI's delays.
Any Apple security issue that surfaces is a potential lawsuit target, and can quickly be seized upon by law firms smelling an opportunity. Once again, that has happened to Apple in the wake of stories about iCloud Private Relay.
The Clarkson Law Firm has filed an attempted class action lawsuit against Apple, accusing the company of deceiving consumers with its marketing of iCloud+ subscriptions. Specifically, for perceived failures in iCloud Private Relay.
Readers may be aware of Clarkson Law Firm from the settlement with Apple over the delayed introduction of Siri AI. While the class-action lawsuit was settled in December 2025, it wasn't until May 2026 that the $250M settlement details were actually revealed.
Under the new lawsuit, 9to5Mac writes that the firm is going after what it calls an "outrageous betrayal of consumer trust." Apple customers paid based on a promise of privacy, the firm insists, which was broken after a few years.
The protection of iCloud Private Relay "simply didn't work," the firm continued, exposing consumers to potentially being tracked and profiled in ways Apple fought to defend against.
Apple has yet to comment about the lawsuit.
Security flaws
On August 4, a report claimed that Apple's iCloud Private Relay was susceptible to a number of leaks in WebKit. Apple requires all browsers to use WebKit on iPhone, which means all mobile browsers for iOS are affected.
DNS prefetching, WebAuthn for Passkeys, and WebTransport can all reveal data about a user, even if they're using a proxy or iCloud Private Relay.
DNS prefetching in iOS 26 meant that hostnames could be resolved through the normal DNS path rather than through a proxy, exposing some data. WebAuthn's Passkey validation file revealed IP addresses, with WebTransport also doing so when opening a direct HTTP/3 connection.
While Apple will have to address all of the issues in due course, they will be elements that the new lawsuit will be leaning on.
