I just got a warning letter from AT&T in the mail for tethering without a tethering plan and they are threatening to eliminate my unlimited plan. I am going to stop now that they have warned me so I don't loose the plan but does anyone know how they detect it. I tethered a lot last month but I have been tethering for about 6 months now undetected. Last month though, I used 2GB of data compared to the 1GB I normally use. Is it only the spike which made them guess. I use the android wifi tether app. I heard a couple ways of how they do it.
1) They look at the user agent.
2) They look at the TCP/IP header for the number of hops. (Tetherers will have an extra hop) -if this is true if I used wired tether it would be fine
3) Just the spike in data usage.
I'm curious to know how they do it and if there is a way to stop them from knowing. There is a lot of this for the iphone but not for androids. Anybody know more about this
I have used wired tether and they stilll detect it.... Time for you to invest in home broadband.
How were you contacted or notified that you were tethering from AT&T? I have done it a number of times using wireless AP and never heard a thing.
Related
Is tethering going to be an option you can sign up for, or rather, something that they will detect and bill you for ?
I can't seem to find anything on their website as far as adding tethering to your plan. I have no gripes about paying for it, especially since now I have WiFi calling... I just dropped my plan down to 500 minutes as I plan on doing most everything via WiFi anyhow.
I do not know their plans. I am tethering with my Nexus while I am waiting on my order for this phone from the retention department.
I will be watching my billings to see if they are able to charge for this beginning today.
JWhipple said:
Is tethering going to be an option you can sign up for, or rather, something that they will detect and bill you for ?
I can't seem to find anything on their website as far as adding tethering to your plan. I have no gripes about paying for it, especially since now I have WiFi calling... I just dropped my plan down to 500 minutes as I plan on doing most everything via WiFi anyhow.
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I was curious as well...I dont know if they can detect that you are tethering, especially in places that have 4G service. The phone itself is capable of pulling quite a bit of data.
I can say that I have already flexed the tethering app installed on the phone and it works great...even on 3G. Its not something I abuse. If I need to tether to my laptop here at work, I do...then get off. I know some people who have cut out their home ISP and rely on tethering even to run their PS3 and XB360. That I think is being a little greedy for a service that T-Mobile has been pretty lenient with thus far.
On a side note...you would think that there would be a popup disclaimer "this app may result in charges...blah,blah,blah" when you open the default hotspot app...but there is not, leading me to believe that they may never take notice of casual tethering.
I was just using PDANet on my friend's laptop and I got two texts from T-Mobile saying the following: "Free T-Mobile Msg: Phone Tethering & Wi-Fi Sharing access has been blocked. Please add a Phone Tethering & Wi-Fi Sharing plan available at my.t-mobile.com"
Now I ignored it until the browser sent me to a signup page. I've tried WiFi Tether, Bluetooth, and Barnacle and it blocks each one. Anyone else get this?
Sent from my T-Mobile G2 using XDA App
using wireless tether right now... no problems...
maybe they'll end up sending me a text.
I don't have my laptop with me, so I can't test this myself. But if it's true, the Nexus One forums are about to A-SPLODE. You'll be able to hear it from space...
ryaninc said:
I don't have my laptop with me, so I can't test this myself. But if it's true, the Nexus One forums are about to A-SPLODE. You'll be able to hear it from space...
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Click to collapse
A-SPLODE!! Lmfao just made my day!
But yeah... if this is true then all I can do is throw the f-bomb around because I rely heavily on tethering and no way in hell am I going to pay for a service I've been using for free...
No problems with Wireless Tether on my G1...and I tether a ton. I was up to 7gb last month :/
Kazan22 said:
I was just using PDANet on my friend's laptop and I got two texts from T-Mobile saying the following: "Free T-Mobile Msg: Phone Tethering & Wi-Fi Sharing access has been blocked. Please add a Phone Tethering & Wi-Fi Sharing plan available at my.t-mobile.com"
Now I ignored it until the browser sent me to a signup page. I've tried WiFi Tether, Bluetooth, and Barnacle and it blocks each one. Anyone else get this?
Sent from my T-Mobile G2 using XDA App
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http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=840423
Not just you.
That would suck. Would this apply to USB tethering as well, or just WiFi?
PDANet IS usb tethering.
:O
oh... and someone at the Vibrant forums is having the same issue... which is why I'm here.
:X
I am tethering from my G2 (USB tether) to post this message. It works fine, though TMO might be rolling this block out.
Edit: I am posting this via Wifi tether, so that seems to be working for me currently.
I just checked PDANet and WiFi hotspot and they both worked, so I guess they're "rolling" this out.
Makes me wonder...some of us never got the OTA rollout. I wonder if perhaps I'll never get this rollout either.
I think they can affect PDANet and Easytether since they are market apps. Wireless Tether for Android and Wired Tether for Android aren't market apps so im pretty sure those are beyond T-Mobile's grip.
Might have something to do with the G2 not being rooted and trying to tether. I think after its rooted it should work without a problem. At least thats what a tmo rep told me.
When I read all this on the xda app, i went ahead and hooked up to wifi tether. thats how i'm writing this msg. I am rooted and do have the largest plan tmo offers which includes the unlimited data. idk. we shall see. oh yea, no tmo msg as of yet.
I'm unrooted and used wifi tether this morning for 3 hours with no problems. I just don't understand how they can detect us using it.
Sent from my T-Mobile G2 using Tapatalk
johnbibbs said:
I'm unrooted and used wifi tether this morning for 3 hours with no problems. I just don't understand how they can detect us using it.
Sent from my T-Mobile G2 using Tapatalk
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There are various techniques they could use to do this; if we know exactly what they're doing, we can probably bypass it.
Probably one of the simplest techniques would be user agent sniffing; if they see desktop user agents from the same device, they'd know something funky was going on.
I'd be interested to know whether the OP can work around this situation by changing his user agent string on his desktop browser. I'd also be interested to know whether the phone browser continues to work properly even after he's been caught, and if so, whether changing the user agent string on the phone causes it to report the block message as well.
Another test for whether they're sniffing user agents is to try to make an ssl connection instead of http from the desktop browser. Assuming that the phone browser still works, SSL on the desktop browser should also still work, if all they're doing is user agent sniffing.
In an HD2 thread one guy was saying that he was downloaded a movie to his phone, but wasn't tethering when he got the text. Perhaps they're determining by the amount of data used in a specific amount of time. If that's the case it supports the theory of TMO seeing all data as data.
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=840360
ddgarcia05 said:
In an HD2 thread one guy was saying that he was downloaded a movie to his phone, but wasn't tethering when he got the text. Perhaps they're determining by the amount of data used in a specific amount of time. If that's the case it supports the theory of TMO seeing all data as data.
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=840360
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That's actually good, then. If they're using such a naive detection method, it's sure to result in a ton of false positives from people legitimately using a lot of data with their phones, and consumer complaints should result in them disabling it before too long.
If this works like any of T-Mobile's other services then they prorate the add-ons so you can add it when you need it, then cancel it when you don't and you would only pay a fraction of that $15. I do this with the hotspot feature all the time - enable it for a trip when I'll spend a lot of time in a hotel (or airports, etc.) where they offer wireless and then cancel it at the end of the trip and I pay less than a single day of wifi at a major hotel.
(disclosure - I snatched this post off the T-mobile.com forum but I was going to say the same thing!)
I need to confirm this "add it when you need it". Not good for everybody but for those of us that need tethering a few times a month it's not so bad, 50 cents for one day. Tried via the chat on T-Mobile.com to confirm this but they are useless!
When I first applied the OTA and started playing with the built in tethering, I noticed some log entries from DataConnectionTracker whenever I turned tethering on or off. When I enabled temp root with Visionary and tried using the stand alone Wireless and Wired tether for root apps, these entries did not appear.
I haven't had time to play with it much, but it might be useful to run logcat with a filter for only DataConnectionTracker activity while trying a variety of tethering techniques under root and non-root circumstances.
Of course the experience reported by the HD2 user does not line up with this theory, but there may be multiple things going on. If T-Mo really is blocking based on data volume, it will completely blow up on them as people start intentionally doing data intensive things without tethering.
I sure as hell hope they don't do this to the grandfathered plans... cause if they do, I'm gonna go on a *****-storm.
Edit: I'm tethering on the WiFi hotspot app and I didn't get any notice. Everything is as it has been since I've had this app. If not, I have Wireless Tether for Root Users. I refuse to pay $15 extra bucks a month when I paid for an unlimited plan a couple of years back.
T-mobile to charge 14.99 tethering fee come nov 3rd:
"Because T-Mobile Terms & Conditions have not permitted tethering in the past, those customers who have configured their device for tethering will receive a message on their handset advising them they will need to add the new add-on feature to continue using their device as a modem."
I looked through the old tethering threads and everyone was just guessing and said "it's probably too hard for T-mobile to catch you" but no one knew for sure and I am wondering if people have gotten this upgrade message since November when they use the native tethering
I have not gotten a message from T-Mobile regarding tethering. I still do, but it seems flakier than usual (disconnects more often) but still works.
never had that problem, i tether occasionally also and i'm fine. I'm on the 9.99 web2go plan.
No issues or messages...tether a lot with unlimited data plan.
My nexus is my only internet connection and I use about 4gigs a month and so far no messages from tmo
I think it would be pretty hard for them to be able to tell.
N.B. I am using the word tethering to mean any function whereby the phone shares its internet connection with another device be it through WiFi or through a USB cable.
From my personal understanding and from what I have read here on XDA and elsewhere, there are two main ways that a handset can preform the tethering function. Depending on the method that a handset employs to fulfill the tethering function, determines if T-Mobile is easily capable of ascertaining if a subscriber is tethering or not
Method 1:
The handset simply acts as a Modem passing DATA from the network directly to the tethered device. In this case, as the handset is strictly a modem, T-Mobile is easily capable of determining if a subscriber is tethering or not because the requests for DATA are not coming from the handset but from a 2nd device (i.e. a laptop/desktop/etc.).
Method 2:
The handset takes DATA requests from the tethered device/s and passes them through as if they were requests from the handset itself. Essentially the handset is making all DATA requests to the network and then passing back those DATA requests to tethered device/s. In this case, other than raw DATA consumption T-Mobile would be unable to determine if a user is tethering or simply using a bunch of DATA on their handset.
I am not sure that anybody has exactly said which Method our N1s employ but if I were to hazard a guess it would be Method 2.
Dan
dan1431 said:
N.B. I am using the word tethering to mean any function whereby the phone shares its internet connection with another device be it through WiFi or through a USB cable.
From my personal understanding and from what I have read here on XDA and elsewhere, there are two main ways that a handset can preform the tethering function. Depending on the method that a handset employs to fulfill the tethering function, determines if T-Mobile is easily capable of ascertaining if a subscriber is tethering or not
Method 1:
The handset simply acts as a Modem passing DATA from the network directly to the tethered device. In this case, as the handset is strictly a modem, T-Mobile is easily capable of determining if a subscriber is tethering or not because the requests for DATA are not coming from the handset but from a 2nd device (i.e. a laptop/desktop/etc.).
Method 2:
The handset takes DATA requests from the tethered device/s and passes them through as if they were requests from the handset itself. Essentially the handset is making all DATA requests to the network and then passing back those DATA requests to tethered device/s. In this case, other than raw DATA consumption T-Mobile would be unable to determine if a user is tethering or simply using a bunch of DATA on their handset.
I am not sure that anybody has exactly said which Method our N1s employ but if I were to hazard a guess it would be Method 2.
Dan
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Interesting, I read someone say on here that when they tethered, ads were blocked on their tethered computer, because the had 'adfree' on their device. This would only make sense if method 2 was what was used, so assuming i have the facts correct, it is method 2.
I can USB tether fine, but today I got the upgrade message when trying to wifi tether. =/
(tmobile and cm7)
tether all the time....no issues with charges for me im on the unlimited Android web plan so i dont know if that has anything to do with me not getting charged extra to tether
I have the Unlimited data plan. I have been tethering on and off. I have even done a wifi hotspot for two laptops. Haven't gotten anything yet. But I will keep an eye out.
i use my N1 to tether my G-tab constantly. I always get the 5gb cap text, but have never gotten a tether text. I use wireless tether for root as opposed to the native option so I do notice that it is ad-free and probably falls under the method 2 of tethering.
I have been able to tether with USB or "the cord" from the day I opened the box and that was before I added the hotspot plan. I have never rooted the phone or put a tethering app on the phone. I had an issue with "throttling", thats fixed now, but I can still tether via USB, but hotspot says no go. I know you need a plan for hotspot, but they only call it hotspot and there is no USB tethering plan listed.
So I am not sure if it's under the hotspot plan or it's just part of the 4GB plan I had, before I got unlimited and something messed up. I hope it's part of the base unlimited data plan, but I don't think it is.
Anyway just wanted to know what the deal is. I have only done 300mb off it and have not even went over 3GB on my unlimited data plan yet. LOL
P.S Before the "throttling" or what ever you want to call it I had used way too much, like 89GB much. ( My internet was about dead for two months and now it's fixed.)
Thanks in advance.
Hi, I have a 6p and I'm on Verizon with an unlimited data plan. I've done some research and I've seen that people have been able to use the native hotspot feature without a subscription check. My question is, does using the hotspot feature without the subscription incur a charge on your bill even with unlimited data? Sorry in advance if this has already been asked and addressed. Running stock, no root. I have turned on the hotspot, used it on my PC and it does in fact work.
I have unlimited data and DO NOT have a tethering plan. I have used hotspot, not a ton, but have used it and have no charges. I have used an Xposed module in the past, or the build.prop mod to enable tethering, which bypasses the provisioning check from VZW, but it has not been necessary yet.
Like I said, I've only used it a few times for rather short periods when I needed to look something up and my Chromebook was easier than my phone, etc. I also used it for my PS Vita to do Remote Play to my PS4 on a vacation, which I imagine used a fair bit of data, but it was only for 20-30 minutes at a time over a few days.
Your results may vary, depending on what you use it for, how much data you use, etc.
Jake11584 said:
Hi, I have a 6p and I'm on Verizon with an unlimited data plan. I've done some research and I've seen that people have been able to use the native hotspot feature without a subscription check. My question is, does using the hotspot feature without the subscription incur a charge on your bill even with unlimited data? Sorry in advance if this has already been asked and addressed. Running stock, no root. I have turned on the hotspot, used it on my PC and it does in fact work.
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Click to collapse
I use it all the time.
No changes, it just works out of the box.
Actually my computer. is tethered as I type.
I use a VPN to hide all my traffic from Verizon so they can't snoop packets and determine if I'm tethering or not.