Nikon announced that part of its "COOLPIX 5700," "COOLPIX SQ" and "COOLPIX 3100" digital camera products may present malfunctions.

The malfunctions may show as bizarre color of images, monitors disable to display any image or image distortion. The company offers free repair for products confirmed as having such malfunctions.

The cause of the defect is CCD bonding that degrades as time passes by. Judging from the symptoms, cause and market release dates, it is highly possible that these malfunctions are also caused by the same factors as in other CCD defects recently found in products from Sony, Fuji Photo Film, JVC and Canon. The COOLPIX 5700 was released in June 2002, while the COOLPIX SQ and COOLPIX 3100 were launched in June and March 2003, respectively. Total shipments of these three models have reached more than 2.1 million units, all of which use CCDs procured by a third-party company.