Google may face ‘major' lawsuit as users claim facing more issues with company's smart home devices
is set to face a class action lawsuit as a growing number of its smart home device users have reported experiencing more issues. These issues include misheard commands, delayed responses, and ignored instructions. US law firm
Kaplan Gore LLP
has launched an investigation into a potential class action lawsuit against the company. The law firm is exploring legal action due to Google's alleged failure to "remedy increasing problems with its
Google Home
'smart home' service." The firm notes that many users have reported functionality issues with devices that previously worked well and had stable internet connections. Kaplan Gore also claims that Google is allowing these problems with Google Home to "increase in scale and frequency nationwide" and is "not providing the service it promised users." This comes despite Google's assurances that improvements are imminent.
How Google Home issues are affecting users and what the company said
The problems started last week when Google acknowledged growing user frustration with several Google Home speakers and announced plans for "major improvements." Less than a week later, reports suggest that the problems may be escalating.
The issues seem to be linked to Google Assistant, which is set to be replaced by Gemini AI. In recent weeks, the current voice assistant has already seen a reduction in available features ahead of the transition.
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In a recent post shared on X, Aniah Kattukaran, the Chief Product Officer for
Google Home Nest
, admitted to the problems and wrote:
'Hey everyone, I want to acknowledge the recent feedback about Google Assistant reliability on our home devices. I sincerely apologise for what you're experiencing and feeling!
We hear you loud and clear and are committed to getting this right -- and making sure we have a long term solution that provides better reliability and capability. We have been actively working on major improvements for sometime and will have more to share in the fall.'
Even after acknowledging the issues, user dissatisfaction remains high. Android Police highlighted a Reddit thread in the Google Home subreddit where several users reported that voice controls for smart lights had stopped working entirely.
While device subreddits typically feature product questions or troubleshooting help, the Google Home subreddit is currently filled with complaints about broken voice controls. The situation prompted an official Google moderator to respond twice within the same thread.
'We're aware of an issue with using voice commands to control some lights. We'll share an update as soon as possible, thanks for your patience,'
the moderator stated.
In a follow-up post, the moderator mentioned a fix was being rolled out, though they added that
"some users might still be experiencing issues."
One user complained:
"You're not adding features..so how do you manage to sc**w up the old ones that worked?"
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