Watchdog group SumOfUs has put up a new online petition in which it has demanded that Apple's next-generation iPhone - which is widely referred to as the iPhone 5 - should be the "the first ethical iPhone"; thereby hinting that the iPhone-maker should take necessary measures to clean up its act in its overseas iPhone manufacturing factories like Foxconn.

The petition, put up by SumOfUs last week, has come in the wake of the fact that Apple has been in the firing line of the media, yet again, for the deplorable working conditions at its overseas factories as well as the practices it follows for these manufacturing units.

The SumOfUs online petition - which reportedly witnessed as many as 35,000 signatories within 24 hours - chiefly lays emphasis on the fact that Apple should "overhaul the way its suppliers treat their workers" before it launches the iPhone 5, which is apparently under development at present and will be launched somewhere in late 2012.

Describing itself as a "movement of consumers, workers and shareholders speaking with one voice to counterbalance the growing power of large corporations," SumOfUs said on its website that the imminent launch of the iPhone
5 this year has given the group a big chance as "ethical consumers."

Noting that the iPhone is a highly popular handset but Apple needs to revamp its practices, the group's executive director Taren Stinebrickner-Kauffman said: "I use an iPhone myself. I love it, but I don't love having to support sweatshops, and neither do millions of other Apple consumers."