A woman has sued Apple because the power button stopped working after her one-year warranty had ended.

iPhones aren't cheap, so we expect them and their components to live a long life. But, as one woman from Florida found out, that's not always the case.

Read next: 33 tips to help boost iPhone battery life | How to back up an iPhone | How to fix an iPhone with a broken off button

Debra Hilton, who has owned an iPhone 4 for just 15 months, has sued Apple because the power button has stopped working. As her one-year warranty has ended, Apple refused to replace Debra's iPhone and left her with two options. One of them is a repair, which would deprive her of $149.99 (£98) (shipping not included), the other option is for Hilton to buy a new iPhone; and we all know they are quite expensive.

Hilton decided to fight back and searched the internet for guides which would explain how to repair the power button. She stumbled upon Apple's Community Support site, which showed that many more people had the same problem with the power button on the iPhone 4. The thread has been viewed more than 800,000 times and contains more than 400 posts. She also had a look at many YouTube videos, before coming to an iFixit guide on how to replace the power button.

According to a Fortune report, having noticed that hundreds of iPhone 4 owners had experienced the same fault with the power button, Hilton concluded that it must have been a "carefully planned obsolescence", with the button being designed in such a way that it stops working just after a year of being used (in conjunction with the warranty expiring).

Hilton has sued Apple for $5 million citing a federal racketeering law and claiming that Apple knew of the issue.

Surely it would have been easier for Apple to replace the out-of-warranty iPhone, wouldn't it?

This isn't the first time that Apple has been sued. In December 2012, 83 year-oldEvelyn Paswall sued the company after breaking her nose, when she walked into an unmarked glass door in an Apple Store, located in New York. Evelyn's lawyer stated that the glass door had"no markings on the glass, or they were inadequate".

Apple has also been sued by an Oklahoma woman, who claims a TV interview she gave was sampled and sold on iTunes without her consent. She famously said "I got bronchitis! Ain't nobody got time for that!"This quickly became an internet sensation.

In addition, a New York man sued Apple over the Siri voice assistant feature on the iPhone 4S, saying that it doesn't work as advertised. 

There will be many more attempts from the public at suing Apple, we will have to wait and see how weird they will get.

Marcelina Zwegrodzka is the author of this Apple blog.