The Magnuson–Moss Warranty Act forbids these types of policies, as well as the warranty-void-if-removed security stickers that are placed over screws or seams in video game consoles. After being warned by the FTC, both Sony and Nintendo altered their policy and updated their documentation online. Microsoft, apparently, has not.
“The goal is to intimidate consumers and repair organizations and deceive them into thinking that that a warranty is void if anybody other than Microsoft opens up the box,” David Slade, an attorney at the law firm Carney Bates & Pulliam—the firm representing Baskett in his lawsuit—told me over the phone.
Right to repair activists have told Motherboard that these stickers and policies are designed to intimidate customers into thinking that they are unable to fix their own devices.