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Can someone clarify this for me (still haven't finished my coffee yet): If T-Mobile is offering "Unlimited Mobile Hotspot" data as a part of their plans then ho

by NovaS1X 11y ago

Can someone clarify this for me (still haven't finished my coffee yet): If T-Mobile is offering "Unlimited Mobile Hotspot" data as a part of their plans then how exactly is this stealing?

compsciphd 11y ago
they don't offer "unlimited mobile hotspot". They explicitly say hotspot usage is limited. What's unlimited is "non hotspot usage" (i.e. regular app usage). One might view this as splitting hairs (and I'm somewhat sympathetic to that view).
jsnell 11y ago
The very first sentence of the article says that they in fact don't offer unlimited tethering, but that their "unlimited data" plan has explicit language limiting tethering to a few GB, while traffic coming from the actual mobile device is unlimited. That seems fair enough.
- drivingmenuts 11y ago
  Technically speaking, it's all data coming from the mobile device. Hotspotting occurs on my device without their involvement since it's a feature of the hardware, not the cellular network. In effect, T-Mobile sells you a device and then rents out the capability of your own device. One right way to do it is to put a hard cap on data usage but then they couldn't use the term "unlimited" and T-Mobile would lose customers. The other right way to do is soft-cap all data coming from the device, which would allow "unlimited".
chc 11y ago
They aren't. They're offering unlimited mobile data with a limited hotspot feature.
JohnTHaller 11y ago
They don't advertise unlimited hot spot. They advertise unlimited data for your mobile device and 6gb of hot spot data. Some users are cheating and masking their hot spot data used by multiple PCs and sometimes servers to get around the 6gb limit without having to pay for the additional hot spot data.
- thescriptkiddie 11y ago
  You actually don't have to do any masking, it just works. It's not like your phone tells T-Mobile's servers when you start tethering, or they can detect tethering through DPI. It all looks the same to them. So when they accuse customers of "cheating" because they neglected to obey a hidden clause in a contract they didn't read, it comes across as insulting.
  - peterwwillis 11y ago
    You can totally detect tethering through packet inspection. There's big differences between mobile and desktop tcp/ip traffic, not to mention wildly different application data fingerprints. It should actually be really easy for them. They probably just can't justify the cost. The licensing and additional tools and support may cost hundreds of thousands, maybe millions, for a small section of their customer base, and they have millions of users. So the loss of a marginal amount of extra data use probably is not greater than the cost of looking for and terminating tetherers. (Plus competitive advantage, etc)
  - justinjlynn 11y ago
    Well, technically there is an aspect of the underlying network protocol called time-to-live or TTL. Unless manipulated this value is decremented by each device in the chain on devices between your phone and your carrier. When tethering this value is then lower than it would be if the traffic were source from rather than through your device. Thus, the manipulation to which they refer typically refers to manipulating this value.
  - ryan-c 11y ago
    Android's built in tethering absolutely does explicitly tell T-Mobile you're using it. http://danielpocock.com/android-betrays-tethering-data http://danielpocock.com/android-betrays-tethering-data
- deathanatos 11y ago
  > They advertise unlimited data for your mobile device and 6gb of hot spot data. They do? The vast majority of T-mobile's ads that I've seen are focused on how other data plans from other carriers are "limited", and are not really unlimited, and how T-mobile is the only carrier that offers a real unlimited plan. Quite hypocritical at the moment. The article tries to weasel around it too, > T-Mobile only says it offers unlimited data for standard phone or tablet use. It clearly spells out the limitations "clearly", being, > Unlimited talk, text, and data while on our network in the U.S., plus in Mexico and Canada. Up to 1GB of 4G LTE data (Speeds reduced after 1GB) > Up to 1GB of 4G LTE data per month. 4G LTE data is available while in the U.S., Mexico, and Canada. After all your 4G LTE data is used, data speeds are reduced to 2G speeds through the end of your bill cycle. Add more 4G LTE data whenever you want. Clearly, "clearly" here means you must delve into the 10 pixel legal disclaimer: > Full speeds available up to monthly allotment, including tethering (Unlimited on-smartphone 4G LTE data option includes 7 GB of tethering); then, slowed to up to 2G speeds for rest of billing cycle. The article goes on, > of the "Smartphone Mobile Hotspot" feature, which is included for free in the data plan. "included for free": it's a software capability of your device; T-mobile is providing nothing. I've been cut off for "too much tether" well before the 7GB mark (it was either 512MiB or 2GiB; I've forgotten now…). Frankly, I'm wondering if this isn't one of those living ToS that's been changed a few times. Makes me wonder if I have a hardcopy of the agreement I actually agreed to.

by NovaS1X 11y ago

Can someone clarify this for me (still haven't finished my coffee yet): If T-Mobile is offering "Unlimited Mobile Hotspot" data as a part of their plans then how exactly is this stealing?

compsciphd 11y ago

they don't offer "unlimited mobile hotspot". They explicitly say hotspot usage is limited. What's unlimited is "non hotspot usage" (i.e. regular app usage). One might view this as splitting hairs (and I'm somewhat sympathetic to that view).

jsnell 11y ago

The very first sentence of the article says that they in fact don't offer unlimited tethering, but that their "unlimited data" plan has explicit language limiting tethering to a few GB, while traffic coming from the actual mobile device is unlimited. That seems fair enough.

drivingmenuts 11y ago
Technically speaking, it's all data coming from the mobile device. Hotspotting occurs on my device without their involvement since it's a feature of the hardware, not the cellular network. In effect, T-Mobile sells you a device and then rents out the capability of your own device. One right way to do it is to put a hard cap on data usage but then they couldn't use the term "unlimited" and T-Mobile would lose customers. The other right way to do is soft-cap all data coming from the device, which would allow "unlimited".

chc 11y ago

They aren't. They're offering unlimited mobile data with a limited hotspot feature.

JohnTHaller 11y ago

They don't advertise unlimited hot spot. They advertise unlimited data for your mobile device and 6gb of hot spot data. Some users are cheating and masking their hot spot data used by multiple PCs and sometimes servers to get around the 6gb limit without having to pay for the additional hot spot data.

thescriptkiddie 11y ago
You actually don't have to do any masking, it just works. It's not like your phone tells T-Mobile's servers when you start tethering, or they can detect tethering through DPI. It all looks the same to them. So when they accuse customers of "cheating" because they neglected to obey a hidden clause in a contract they didn't read, it comes across as insulting.
- peterwwillis 11y ago
  You can totally detect tethering through packet inspection. There's big differences between mobile and desktop tcp/ip traffic, not to mention wildly different application data fingerprints. It should actually be really easy for them. They probably just can't justify the cost. The licensing and additional tools and support may cost hundreds of thousands, maybe millions, for a small section of their customer base, and they have millions of users. So the loss of a marginal amount of extra data use probably is not greater than the cost of looking for and terminating tetherers. (Plus competitive advantage, etc)
- justinjlynn 11y ago
  Well, technically there is an aspect of the underlying network protocol called time-to-live or TTL. Unless manipulated this value is decremented by each device in the chain on devices between your phone and your carrier. When tethering this value is then lower than it would be if the traffic were source from rather than through your device. Thus, the manipulation to which they refer typically refers to manipulating this value.
- ryan-c 11y ago
  Android's built in tethering absolutely does explicitly tell T-Mobile you're using it. http://danielpocock.com/android-betrays-tethering-data http://danielpocock.com/android-betrays-tethering-data
deathanatos 11y ago
> They advertise unlimited data for your mobile device and 6gb of hot spot data. They do? The vast majority of T-mobile's ads that I've seen are focused on how other data plans from other carriers are "limited", and are not really unlimited, and how T-mobile is the only carrier that offers a real unlimited plan. Quite hypocritical at the moment. The article tries to weasel around it too, > T-Mobile only says it offers unlimited data for standard phone or tablet use. It clearly spells out the limitations "clearly", being, > Unlimited talk, text, and data while on our network in the U.S., plus in Mexico and Canada. Up to 1GB of 4G LTE data (Speeds reduced after 1GB) > Up to 1GB of 4G LTE data per month. 4G LTE data is available while in the U.S., Mexico, and Canada. After all your 4G LTE data is used, data speeds are reduced to 2G speeds through the end of your bill cycle. Add more 4G LTE data whenever you want. Clearly, "clearly" here means you must delve into the 10 pixel legal disclaimer: > Full speeds available up to monthly allotment, including tethering (Unlimited on-smartphone 4G LTE data option includes 7 GB of tethering); then, slowed to up to 2G speeds for rest of billing cycle. The article goes on, > of the "Smartphone Mobile Hotspot" feature, which is included for free in the data plan. "included for free": it's a software capability of your device; T-mobile is providing nothing. I've been cut off for "too much tether" well before the 7GB mark (it was either 512MiB or 2GiB; I've forgotten now…). Frankly, I'm wondering if this isn't one of those living ToS that's been changed a few times. Makes me wonder if I have a hardcopy of the agreement I actually agreed to.