Toyota agreed to a $78.5 million class action settlement after owners and lessees alleged certain Toyota vehicles were sold with a defective Airbag Control Unit (ACU)—the electronic module that decides, in milliseconds, whether airbags and related restraint systems (like seat-belt pretensioners) should fire during a crash. The lawsuit centers on claims that the ACU can be vulnerable to “electrical overstress,” which could impair how safety systems behave in a collision, including the risk of non-deployment or other malfunctions. Because these systems are designed to work automatically and are difficult for drivers to detect or test on their own, even a small failure rate becomes a serious public-safety concern when spread across large vehicle populations. The case was filed to hold Toyota accountable for allegedly marketing vehicles as safe and reliable while the ACU issue could expose consumers to increased injury risk and unexpected costs tied to recalls and repairs. Beyond cash relief, the settlement’s significance is in the practical remedies it funds: reimbursement for out-of-pocket recall-related expenses (such as towing, rentals, lost wages, and unreimbursed repairs), a potential residual payment (up to $250 if funds remain), an inspection program for certain crash scenarios where restraints did not deploy as expected, a 12-year extended warranty on new parts installed under the recall, and expanded outreach to boost recall completion—reflecting how courts often push automakers to pair compensation with safety-focused corrective programs. More broadly, this dispute fits a long pattern of automotive defect class actions involving critical safety components—especially airbags and their electronics—where plaintiffs argue that recalls alone may not fully address consumer harm, diminished confidence, or the inconvenience and expense of getting a fix. It also sits within the regulatory ecosystem overseen by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA), which governs defect reporting and recall obligations and can scrutinize whether manufacturers moved quickly enough once a safety risk was known; similar cases frequently hinge on the gap between regulatory compliance and what consumers believe they were promised about safety, durability, and performance.