Tethering Question

[Guest SozzaSinnian]

Hi Peeps,

If I tether my HTC Hero is there any way that my operator can tell? I am with 3 UK and would love to tether, I tried WiFi Tether on the custom Modaco rom and it worked wonderfully, just a bit wary that I will get a big bill at the end of the month....

[Guest descenpet]

tether traffic will be counted the same way as you surf net on your phone. if you have a data plan, what you use through tethering will be counted towards your monthly limit. if you don't have data plan, don't try it as you will definitely get a big bill at the end of month.

[Guest SozzaSinnian]

Thanks for the reply descenpet :P

I do have a data plan but it states in there TOS "Unlimited internet and Facebook access is Internet Max add-on (1GB) - phone browsing only"

Which is why I was wondering if they could tell or not, from your responce am I right in saying there is no way for them to tell if I used it on the phone directly or tethered to a PC?

[Guest zorm]

I do have a data plan but it states in there TOS "Unlimited internet and Facebook access is Internet Max add-on (1GB) - phone browsing only"

Which is why I was wondering if they could tell or not, from your responce am I right in saying there is no way for them to tell if I used it on the phone directly or tethered to a PC?

I can't say if they would notice in practice, but depending on what you use the connection for they more than likely could tell if they bothered to look close enough. All you need do is use it for some protocol that one would be very unlikely to see coming from a phone - eg Usenet access, bit-torrent & other peer to peer traffic (off the top of my head, E&OE).

[Guest kendon]

they can definetly see it, but usually are not allowed to do the necessary dpi (deep packet inspection) due to data privacy laws. i am not sure about this fact in general, but for example here in germany there are data plans for the iphone available, which are only allowed to use with the iphone. if you put your iphone-contract-sim into another phone the provider can tell by the vlan tags that you are not using your iphone, and will charge you for the data (this actually happened to someone i know).

[Guest SozzaSinnian]

Thanks for the input peeps.

If/When I do use it, it would only be for browsing and maybe downloading the odd file or two. Certainly wouldn't be hammering Newsgroups with it although that thought did tickle me a little lol

Guess I'll just wait a month and see if they bill me for it, if not then use a little more next time and take it from there.

With the android having so many apps it can use I doubt they could really tell given that they are not allowed to fully check due to privacy :P

[Guest SketchF]

Don't know about other networks in the UK, but T-Mobile allow me to tether my Hero as much as I please... up to the 3GB fair usage limit for my data add on. Maybe 3 will be the same? :P I was pretty impressed with this to be honest, as it would be pretty easy for them to charge an extra fee for the privilege (see the iPhone on O2...)

[Guest SozzaSinnian]

Thats a good move by T-Mobile and to be quite frank I don't see why other operators should not allow this as at the end of the day you have paid for the allowance you get allocated, shouldn't matter how you use it :S Obviously if it is a truely unlimited allowance then fair enough.

The fact that 3 state in there TOS "Phone Browsing Only" and the fact that they charge an extra £5 to use via PC makes me think they will charge for it :P Unless they mean you can't use the sim in a dongle :S

Edited April 3, 2010 by SozzaSinnian

[Guest SketchF]

Thats a good move by T-Mobile and to be quite frank I don't see why other operators should not allow this as at the end of the day you have paid for the allowance you get allocated, shouldn't matter how you use it :S Obviously if it is a truely unlimited allowance then fair enough.

The fact that 3 state in there TOS "Phone Browsing Only" and the fact that they charge an extra £5 to use via PC makes me think they will charge for it :( Unless they mean you can't use the sim in a dongle :S

It is pretty good to be honest... I was surprised when I asked in the shop when I was looking at buying the phone, and that's what they told me. I've also seen a few posts on the T-Mobile forums in the same vain. It was one of the reasons I decided to buy it... shame it isn't possible in the stock configuration :P

'Phone browsing only' certainly sounds like they want you to buy the £5 upgrade... I'd probably take the chance, to be honest. I did the same with my JBed iPhone for about 6 months and nothing came of it. But as said previously, if you're just checking emails/basic browsing etc. it's unlikely to get noticed. If they even check at all...