[Infowarrior] - Apple Legal Reportedly Hinders Reporter's Investigation of iPods Catching Fire

[Richard Forno]

Apple Legal Reportedly Hinders Reporter's Investigation of iPods  
Catching Fire
Wednesday July 22, 2009 02:41 PM EST
Written by Eric Slivka

http://www.macrumors.com/2009/07/22/apple-legal-reportedly-hinders-reporters-investigation-of-ipods-catching-fire/

Amy Clancy of KIRO 7 TV in Seattle reports on her investigation of  
complaints of iPods overheating, smoldering and catching fire. The  
complaints, made to the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission,  
amount to over 800 pages of documentation covering 15 incidents that  
Apple's lawyers repeatedly tried to prevent Clancy from accessing  
under a Freedom of Information Act request.
It took more than 7-months for KIRO 7 Consumer Investigator Amy Clancy  
to get her hands on documents concerning Apple's iPods from the  
Consumer Product Safety Commission because Apple's lawyers filed  
exemption after exemption. In the end, the CPSC released more than 800  
pages which reveal, for the very first time, a comprehensive look that  
shows, on a number of occasions, iPods have suddenly burst into  
flames, started to smoke, and even burned their owners.

The complaints cover a broad array of iPod models over the years and  
include incidents that occurred while the devices were charging and not.

Analysis of the incidents suggests that the lithium-ion batteries used  
in the iPods are responsible for the overheating. Apple last summer  
acknowledged that in some cases batteries in the first-generation iPod  
nano could overheat, leading the company to request that concerned  
users contact Apple to discuss possible replacement. Apple's  
replacement policy gained renewed attention earlier this month when  
South Korean media initially suggested that Apple had issued a full  
recall of the first-generation iPod nano, although Apple quickly  
denied that there had been any change in its procedures for the  
affected devices.

While the Consumer Product Safety Commission has not taken action  
against Apple regarding the overheating iPods, the agency is  
requesting that Apple continue to keep it abreast of the situation.  
The agency also notes that Apple has addressed these specific concerns  
in recent model releases by having changed its battery technology,  
although similar reports regarding Apple's newer iPod touch models  
have begun to surface.
One of the reasons the CPSC gives for not taking action now is because  
"the current generation of iPods uses a battery which has not been  
shown to have similar problems." When asked by Clancy, when this  
"current generation" of batteries started being used, and what type of  
battery it is, Apple would not comment. But earlier this year a  
lawsuit against Apple was filed in Cincinnati because, the lawyer  
claims, an iPod Touch, one of Apple's newest edition of iPods, also  
powered by a lithium ion battery, exploded and caught fire while in a  
teenager’s pocket. The suit claims the boy suffered second-degree  
burns to his leg, and that the iPod was off at the time. This incident  
is not included in the CPSC's file.