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aubeynarf ,

yeah they are selling “wireless home
internet” hard now, can’t have people using their phone hotspot for that.

Presi300 ,
@Presi300@lemmy.world avatar

How do they even know if you use your data as a hotspot? That's just ridiculous!

Appoxo ,

Probably local/system services on the app when the SIM is activated (like it's with sim locked phones)

pup_atlas ,

Nope, it’s either inspecting the TTL of packets coming from your phone (unless you have a VERY custom setup, the TTL from devices other than your phone will be very different), or it’s deep packet inspection. I tried to trick t-mobile last year into giving me home internet on a phone sim, so I did a whack ton of research.

Cl1nk ,

Did you find a way to avoid detection?

iliketurtles ,

On US Mobile (Verizon) using a VPN on my phone when tethering seems to bypass detection. At least the meter on the dashboard says I've used 0gb hotspot.

FlyingSquid OP ,
@FlyingSquid@lemmy.world avatar

Makes you wonder what else they know about what you're doing online.

rab ,
@rab@lemmy.ca avatar

Read permanent record by snowden

FlyingSquid OP ,
@FlyingSquid@lemmy.world avatar

He wrote that 5 years ago (admittedly I have yet to read it), so who knows what they've been able to do since then than he hadn't even thought of.

rab ,
@rab@lemmy.ca avatar

It's still very relevant and one of the most mind blowing things I've ever read

FlyingSquid OP ,
@FlyingSquid@lemmy.world avatar

Oh I'm sure it's still relevant, I'm saying things have probably gotten even worse.

rab ,
@rab@lemmy.ca avatar

Well if you ever read it you'll wonder how it can even get any worse haha

FlyingSquid OP ,
@FlyingSquid@lemmy.world avatar

It can always get worse. Any time someone says it can't get any worse, it does.

I was told abortion restrictions couldn't get any worse too. Then they started removing rape exceptions.

UckyBon ,

Monitoring DNS requests to their own servers.

dsco ,

They look at the TTL of the incoming packets. This can be modified in the windows registry.

4am ,

You see, this is why we need net neutrality

EDIT: see, im glad someone else said it already

Nurgle ,

Net neutrality really wouldn’t stop this, just make them reword the limit.

4am ,

No differentiation of traffic. Eg hotspots vs mobile apps can’t be a separate limit. So 5Gb/month has to be for everything or it must be for nothing.

KillingTimeItself ,

you also have unlimited data, unless you hit a data cap, and then you hit a data rate limit, so technically your data is actually limited.

Can we legislate these fucks to just actual provide the bandwidth they claim to? I.E. a max cap of the max bandwidth * the max amount of time it can be available for in a billing period. Anything else is fraud IMO.

Dettweiler42 ,

We had legislation for this stuff. Then Trump put Shit Pai in the FCC chairman spot and proceeded to gut all of the net neutrality and consumer protection regulations.

KillingTimeItself ,

ajit pai* or however the fuck you spell it, idk im american, i have no culture.

pewgar_seemsimandroid ,

get calyx

loudWaterEnjoyer ,
@loudWaterEnjoyer@lemmy.dbzer0.com avatar

Get a custom ROM and a VPN.

LodeMike ,

Can custom ROMs hide hotspotting?

CrayonRosary ,

Probably, but all you really need is an app called EasyTether. I wrote a big comment about it on this post.

Fondots ,

I don't know the current state of things, it's probably more than 10 years since I've bothered with rooting and custom rooms and such.

But back then I remember my phone company tried to make me pay extra for tethering and there were a few tricks using root to get around it. I think there were a few apps out there that would work on the stock room that needed root, and I think it just worked out of the box with a custom ROM.

IIRC, at that time, my carrier had disabled the tethering options in the phone settings, and to tether you had to use their pre-installed app. My memory may be fuzzy on that though.

Zikeji ,
@Zikeji@programming.dev avatar

Yes and no. A custom kernel with a patch usually referred to as a "ttl fix" can, but a good amount of ROMs have that in their kernel by default.

loudWaterEnjoyer ,
@loudWaterEnjoyer@lemmy.dbzer0.com avatar

Yes of course, it's a software thing.

LodeMike ,

Neat

loudWaterEnjoyer ,
@loudWaterEnjoyer@lemmy.dbzer0.com avatar

Yes, if you spend a little time on it you can slowly phase out all of the fucked up software with better alternatives. I could also help you if you have questions.

LodeMike ,

I was planning on getting a pixel with Graphene OS because that's the only one that seems reasonable.

loudWaterEnjoyer ,
@loudWaterEnjoyer@lemmy.dbzer0.com avatar

Good choice

Veraxus ,

Data is data in the same way water is water and electricity is electricity; nobody should have the power to dictate how you use it. I really wish we’d enshrine genuine net neutrality and shut this kind of nonsense down.

Crozekiel ,

Except there is not a physical commodity or production at the other end of which they are supplying me a portion of a finite amount. If they "pipe" is big enough to supply what is promised to every end user it is supplied to, the water company or power company can still run out of water or power if one person uses a ridiculous amount. The ISP can't run out of "data", they aren't even supplying it - it comes from a host. The ISP is just responsible for running the cables, or "connecting the pipes".

The ISPs loves using the comparison to water or power, because you get charged more for using more of either and that is how they have convinced lawmakers (who are so old and out of touch they have no idea how the internet works) that using more data should cost more. They've convinced our lawmakers basically that they have a big "tank full of data" and if I use too much, there wont' be any for my neighbors.

The truth is they are selling me something they can't provide - a 250Gbps "pipe" that can't actually supply 250Gbps if everyone they sold it to wants to use it at the same time. They sell the same pipe to the whole neighborhood and blame the neighborhood when they try to use what they were told they bought.

rainynight65 ,

Except there is no 'unlimited' for water or electricity.

Blackrook7 ,

There used to be

tacostrange ,

This is why we need net neutrality

Zachariah ,
@Zachariah@lemmy.world avatar

And more competition.

Ioughttamow ,

Nationalize the tubes

tyler ,

T-Mobile hasn’t done this for years. Att is just shit

bdonvr ,

Uh?

https://files.catbox.moe/m4wm7j.png

wander1236 ,
@wander1236@sh.itjust.works avatar

When T-Mobile moved to unlimited with the ONE plans, they gave You "unlimited" tethering at "3G speeds", which turned out to be 0.5Mbit/s, an unusably slow speed in 2018.

The Magenta plans gave you 5GB-50GB of full-speed tethering before dropping you to "3G speeds". The current Go5G plans are similar, with a limited amount of usable tethering data before you're, for all practical uses, cut off.

Before the ONE plans, there technically was no hotspot usage limit, but since you had a limited amount of high-speed data, your hotspot was effectively limited to whatever your plan gave you.

All the US carriers limit hotspot usage, partly to prevent someone hooking up a computer to download 50TB of pirated movies while clogging up the bandwidth for everyone else on that tower, and (moreso) partly because they're greedy.

Serinus ,

If it were just bandwidth issues, they'd only limit you during times of congestion.

It's pure greed.

tyler ,

3g speeds are fine, no clue what you’re talking about. I literally tether all the time and when I hit the limit it’s still completely usable, even for YouTube. And getting to that limit is well above the 5gb from ATT. Like I said, att is shit, T-Mobile doesn’t do this and hasn’t for years.

Literally every carrier on the planet limits hotspot data in some manner. This isn’t a US thing.

ColeSloth ,

Lol. They totally do. Their best plan without going arm and a leg for unlimited gives you 50GB a month before dropping to near nothing. Up to a year ago it was 40GB.

tyler ,

50gb is not even close to 5gb and 3g speeds are not even close to 128kbs so no, T-Mobile doesn’t do this.

ColeSloth ,

T mobile has low GB plans that are far less than 40 or 50 GB and 3g is capable of over 3Mbps, so I don't know what dumbassery you're talking about.

tyler ,

128kbps is referring to the ATT limitation so you’re just proving my point. T-Mobile doesn’t do what att does.

thesystemisdown ,

I have T-Mobile. They absolutely do.

tyler ,

I have T-Mobile, they absolutely don’t.

TWeaK ,

This has little to nothing to do with net neutrality, which refers to back end L1 and L2 network interconnections.

Uranium3006 ,
@Uranium3006@kbin.social avatar

what are you talking about? that makes no sense

TheBeege ,

Edit: wait, you might be right. As I understand, net neutrality is for the last mile ISPs, not the L1/L2 providers. So uh... what I explained below isn't relevant. Eh, I'll leave it in case people wanna learn stuff.

It was a bad explanation, assuming you had knowledge of network infrastructure things, but it does make sense. I'll explain things if you're interested.

Net neutrality is the idea that ISPs must treat all content providers equally. Your phone is not a content provider (most likely. You could run a web server on your phone, but... no). YouTube, Netflix, Facebook, TikTok, and your weird uncle's WordPress site are content providers. Without net neutrality, ISPs can say, "Hey YouTube, people request a ton of traffic from you on our network. Pay up or we'll slow down people's connections to you." The "neutrality" part means that ISPs must be neutral towards content providers, not discriminating against them for being high demand by consumers.

For the L1 and L2 part, that's the networking infrastructure. The connection to your home is just tiny cables. I don't recall how many layers there are, but it's just "last mile" infrastructure. The network infrastructure between regions of the country or across the ocean are giant, giant cables managed by internet service providers you've never heard of. They're the kind of providers that connect AT&T to Comcast. These are considered L1 or L2 providers. The data centers of giant companies, like Google for YouTube's case, often pay these L1 or L2 providers to plug directly into their data centers. Why? Those providers are using the biggest, fastest cables to ferry bits and bytes across the planet. You might be pulling gigs from YouTube, but YouTube is putting out... shit, I don't even know. Is there a terabyte connection? Maybe even petabyte? That sounds crazy. I dunno, I failed Google's interview question where they asked me to estimate how much storage does Google Drive use globally. Anyway, I hope that gives you an idea of what L1 and L2 providers are.

I'm not a network infrastructure guy, though. If someone who actually knows what they're talking about has corrections, I'd love to learn where I'm wrong

TWeaK , (edited )

Net neutrality is about service to last mile customers, but it is based upon interconnection agreements across the L1 and L2 level.

ISP's pay for a connection to L1 and L2, so their users (who pay ISP's) can access content on those networks. Websites pay for a connection to L1 and L2 so their content can be available on those networks.

ISP's want to also charge websites for access into their networks of users, in spite of the fact their users already pay them for access to the website content. If some websites don't pay, then ISP's will provide a lower service to their users for those websites. Net neutrality says ISP's should not do this.

Differentiating between locally used data and hotspot data has nothing to do with this. Hotspot data is about the device the data is going to, not where the data is coming from, and typically (or at least traditionally, maybe not so anymore) a PC will use more data than a phone. A PC is more likely to have large multi-gigabyte downloads (eg games), although these days video streaming is perhaps the main bandwidth hog and is generally equal across all devices.

A home internet connection is expected to serve all devices in that home, while a mobile internet connection is expected to serve only that mobile device (excluding mobile broadband options, which serve multiple devices but are typically more expensive). The ISP's network is designed with this in mind.

It is more reasonable for an ISP to only provide data to the phone you're paying for than it is for them to throttle websites you already paid for. However, really both are kind of bullshit - usage limits in general are completely disproportionate to actual costs.

Uranium3006 ,
@Uranium3006@kbin.social avatar

100% this

Nurgle ,

Sorry how would net neutrality do anything but make them reword the policy??

tacostrange ,

The ISP shouldn't care what kind of traffic is going through the network and show it down by type. It should be neutral to it

Nurgle ,

Right… they can still impose data caps. They'll just do the cap at the plan level, like most already do. OPs just on a cheap plan.

TWeaK ,

They can care about what device they're providing internet to. Net neutrality is about where content is coming from.

nao ,

They provide internet to the phone. What the phone does with it (e.g. provide a hotspot), is another story.

TWeaK ,

That depends on whether the connection is sold to cover one device or several.

ColeSloth ,

That's not what net neutrality does, and I'm disturbed by this being the number one comment.

nao ,

Are you talking about net neutrality in general, or a specific campaign that used the term?
Net neutrality means all bits are equal.
It does not matter where a bit is coming from, where it is going to or what it is part of.

ColeSloth ,

No portion of any net neutrality bill anywhere calls for hotspot data to not be capped by a cell carrier. It doesn't eliminate any caps for anything at all. Net neutrality means they can't change the speeds dependant on what sites you're accessing and that they can't block any sites, give free data to access some sites and not others, or put them behind a pay wall. It has nothing to do with general hot spot data caps, or cell phone data caps.

rainynight65 ,

Net neutrality isn't going to do a thing about this kind of stuff. In a best case scenario, you'll end up with overall data usage limitations - no more 'unlimited mobile data'.

ISPs meter data usage because it's pretty much the only way they can impose some form of limitation on a finite capacity to provide such data to you and other customers - other than data rate limits (read: slower speeds). They can't guarantee data rates in almost any setup, because ultimately, while 'data usage' is a bit of an artificial construct and 'data' is not in any way finite, the pipes that deliver the data certainly are of finite capacity. Mobile data capacity - and in fact, any wireless medium - is a shared medium, the more people try to use it simultaneously, the less pleasant it's going to be for each individual user. Ask Starlink users in many US areas how overselling limited capacity impacts the individual user.

Mobile data usage also has different usage patterns than if you're hotspotting your PC. You're not going to download massive games or other bandwidth hogs to your mobile. You probably won't be running a torrent client either. So they can give you unlimited mobile data because you're simply not going to put as much of a strain on the infrastructure with pure on-device usage than you will with hotspotting.

This isn't a defense of what AT&T is doing. But net neutrality isn't going to force them to suddenly be all ethical. It's not going to make them provision infrastructure that doesn't fall over at the first signs of higher-than-usual load. And it certainly can't change the physical realities of wireless data communication. In an ideal world ISPs wouldn't be so greedy and/or beholden to greedy shareholders to be cutting corners, and instead provide sufficient infrastructure that can handle high demand.

And to those who are talking about their workarounds: you may not like it but you've signed a contract. That contract stipulates acceptable use, and if you're found to be breaching the contract terms, the other party is within their rights to terminate the contract. Again, in an ideal world these contract terms would be more balanced towards the needs of the customer, but in the meantime your best recourse against unfavourable contract terms is to take your business elsewhere. And if you can't do that, everything else is at your own risk.

tacostrange ,

If they didn't have the bandwidth, I don't think T-Mobile would offer home Internet and advertise it as much as they do

rainynight65 ,

But where are they offering it? Big cities and densely populated areas where people have options and therefore won't swarm to the product? Or are they offering it in small, remote towns where there's not a lot of competition?

Where I live, mobile home internet is not available outside of metro areas and larger cities, and in the regions mobile towers are chronically underprovisioned and overloaded.

Emerald ,

128kbps is only mildly better then dial up lmao

FlyingSquid OP ,
@FlyingSquid@lemmy.world avatar

And it's 60mbps right now. Not amazing, but also manageable. They could cut it down to 10 or something, which would still make downloading huge files or whatever a pain in the ass, but would also still allow you to do basic things like watch Netflix.

Kcg ,

Start saving webpages for offline use like the good old days!

KillingTimeItself ,

the funniest thing to me, is that realistically, the most useful thing you can do with 128k is torrent.

ISP's literally incentivize you to torrent lmao.

uis ,
@uis@lemm.ee avatar

Yarr!

psion1369 ,

I used to root my phone and then could use the hotspot without my provider knowing.

madcaesar ,

wHy dOeS aNyOnE nEeD rOoT??? - morons replying to me when I tell them rooting our phones is essential to have FULL control over it.

Alk ,

Get Google fi if it's available. Very consumer friendly. Actually let me rephrase that. More consumer friendly than most other cell providers. But it's still Google.

At least all the pricing and features are straight forward and they don't lock any features (like Hotspot) behind paywalls.

GroundedGator ,

Every time the ATT sales people bug me at stores I tell them what I'm paying and that I get unlimited hotspot and they usually say "oh, you're good."

Add to this that Fi actually allows you to add data only SIMS at no cost.

bandwidthcrisis ,

Yeah, even using a hotspot internationally it's the same price, with the same data limits.

And with data-SIMs, it's possible to share that data with a few other devices, still at no extra cost.

Those features are often overlooked when people ask why it's more expensive than e.g. Mint.

Alk ,

Yeah. I haven't used mint, but the apps, account management and overall ease of use and transparency is legendary with Google fi. Those things are also easy to overlook. It's just so easy and doesn't get in my way when I want to manage something like all other carriers.

phoneymouse ,

It’s too expensive. Visible is cheaper and unlimited everything, even hot spot, and no soft data cap.

atrielienz ,

https://www.reddit.com/r/Visible/comments/efsmwg/warning_there_is_a_data_cap/

I know I know, Reddit post. But there is in fact a soft data cap. The guy who made the post was torrenting and received an email for reaching the data abuse threshold.

If you're using FI, and you set the device your using the phone hotspot for to metered connection you're not too terribly likely to reach the data cap on pretty much any of the unlimited fi plans. I do this for work.

phoneymouse , (edited )

lol… 30 terabytes?! Okay. I’m sure even Google Fi has a cap like that. Most people would struggle to even come close to that. It’s 30x the cap of even a home internet provider like Comcast, which usually limits you to 1 terabyte. Most people would have a really hard time hitting even that on their mobile.

The other thing to consider is Visible is cheaper than Google FI too. And most people aren’t going to use anywhere near 30 terabytes.

Praetorian ,

Try plugging your phone on via the USB instead of a WiFi hotspot. It may not detect it as a hotspot.

justinthegeek ,

Doesn't matter, it still gets flagged as hotspot traffic.

cyberpunk007 ,

I wonder if a VPN would make any difference? I have tasker set up to kick on wireguard any time I leave my wifi network. They'd only see my WG port.

justinthegeek ,

It hasn’t made a difference for me, I’m on Verizon if that matters. I’ve got Wireguard set to always on and all traffic but I still get the usage notifications. IIRC there’s a separate apn for any traffic that goes through the hotspot or tethering connection and that’s how it’s monitored. The traffic will be encrypted, but they can still see it.

cyberpunk007 ,

Well that sucks. I wonder if there a way around it if you're rooted

ikidd ,
@ikidd@lemmy.world avatar

Plug it in via USB cable, shouldn't register as a hotspot then. At least that's how it works on linux, IDK about other OS.

skuzz ,

Carriers in the US configure phones so that the tethering APN is always used for tethering specifically over all interfaces, the traffic is also tagged with a different TTL. They also do some malarkey with deep packet inspection (in case you figure out how to modify the APN) to identify if a computer is using the connection (like the initial phone home Windows and Mac both do to determine the type/quality of Internet connection they are connected to.)

All of this one can work around, but it becomes an annoying game of cat and also cat, and then if the carrier "decides" you violated the "spirit" of their TOS, they'll cancel your plan and take your number away.

CaptainHowdy ,
@CaptainHowdy@lemm.ee avatar

This is only possible if you get your phone from the carrier, right? They wouldn't be able to differentiate if you were using an unlocked phone you got from Google or Amazon?

skuzz ,

They force configs on unlocked phones as well, or just don't "certify" them and refuse to let them work. AT&T will go the extra step of locking you out of your SIM card until you call them. The other two are pretty passive about it and your phone just doesn't work right until you put the SIM back in a phone they "like".

edgesmash ,

... but it becomes an annoying game of cat ND also cat...

Hello, The Monarch: https://y.yarn.co/d40afa8f-93a1-4a74-bd4b-328c3bcc8d00_text.gif

01189998819991197253 ,
@01189998819991197253@infosec.pub avatar

Att et al keeps throwing around the word 'unlimited'. I actually had a conversation with Verizon, before I dropped them, and actually used this exact quote to the guy...

https://infosec.pub/pictrs/image/6f0154f5-c257-4420-b1dd-204d305be5a0.webm

He was like, "princess bride. Nice. But, yeah, I have to read the script."

Dasus ,
@Dasus@lemmy.world avatar

Most importantly... did you do the accent?

01189998819991197253 ,
@01189998819991197253@infosec.pub avatar

Hahaha! A light version of it. I already have a light accent, so I emphasized it some, but I didn't want to offend haha

LemmyKnowsBest ,

If I had been your Verizon representative on the phone at that moment, I would've had a hearty chuckle then rewarded you everything free for the rest of your life. Unlimited. And I'd really mean it this time. Unlimited.

LemmyKnowsBest ,

Thank you for putting this into words. Verizon does the same thing to me, I've been on the same plan for four or five years, and I haven't been able to articulate it the way you did. Thank you for explaining what's happening.

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