Roku and TCL have been accused of knowingly selling TVs with defective software that stops them working. The accusation was made in a class action lawsuit in California, USA.
The Roku OS operating system features on TCL's more affordable TVs. It's accused that faults with the former are affecting the latter, as well as other Roku TVs.
Plaintiff Terri Else alleges that Roku's software updates left the TVs inoperable. Issues include the TVs being 'bricked' (i.e. showing a black screen and unable to operate), restarting over and over, the screen flashing on and off, and freezing.
The lawsuit was filed against Roku Inc. and TTE Technology Inc. (trading as TCL North America) in the United States District Court, Central District of California.
It states that "Roku's software updates are repetitively defective, materially impairing the functionality of Roku Products, rendering many consumers' televisions either entirely unusable ("bricked"), blacked out, or otherwise substantially degraded in terms of device performance".
It also accuses the firms of failing to issue a fix to the problems they have introduced.
It says that Roku is a platform "which cuts corners, failing to ensure that the software updates are actually free of defects both in testing stages and at scale, failing to adequately invest in software updates which harmonise with the Roku Products, and failing to take appropriate remediative and corrective action once a defective software update is released".
Models affected include – but are not limited to – the Roku Select Series, Roku Plus Series, and TCL 3/4/5/6 Series Roku TVs.
The lawsuit points to complaints on Roku's official community forums, highlighting issues, and the responses that amount to "often unsuccessful self-guided troubleshooting instructions".
It says that the firms' failure to take action is a breach of express and implied warranties, as well as California's Unfair Competition Law and Consumers Legal Remedies Act.
The lawsuit demands a jury trial and requests declaratory and injunctive relief plus damages and restitution for members of class action.
Apple recently settled a class action lawsuit in California that could see affected customers paid $95 each (around £70 / AU$130).
It's early days yet in the suit, so it's likely to be a while until any conclusion is reached.
A Roku spokesperson told us: "We believe the claims are meritless." We've contacted TCL for comment and will update this if we hear back.
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