Unknown data usage early morning

but at least Verizon doesn't screw their customers for the whole billing cycle.

here's what the article says:

- Verizon doesn't slow down the "5 percent" unless the cell tower their phone is connected to is congested at that moment, and it slows them down by the minimum amount necessaryI can't remember anything good, in phone/data service and customer service, from AT&T since I switched from Verizon in 2007 to use iphone.

only reason I haven't switched to other carriers is the ability to use the internet while on the phone.

well, that's the only thing good with AT&T I suppose.

You keep stating wifi is off when phone is asleep. so the fact that i can ping my phone at any time during its "sleep" and get a strong return, mean that the wifi is on or off? Only when the phone is off will a ping not respond...soooooo...

The huge data packets imo are a rouse to spike data plans and chum more money...the last one here was 237MB! with no progs in background...please, I dont have 237 MB on the entire phone!!!

Start pining the phone continuously (ping -t in Windows, just ping on a mac). Press the Sleep button. Within one minute the pings will time out, unless the phone is plugged in.

Have you put a data monitor app on the phone. and checked the usage in Settings? Does it show approximately the same usage that shows up on your bill? If it does, your phone is really using that much data. If they don't match then you have a claim against AT&T.

And don't be ridiculous; you can have 100 times 237 MB on your phone if you have a 32 GB phone.

BTW, an associate just dumped his iPhone for a Samsung Galaxy. In the first 2 weeks it used 1.7 GB of data. It's not just an iPhone issue.

It's likely that you really are using that much data, especially if you have a busy Exchange email account or have the Facebook app. Or are using iStream for your photos (each photo is 2-4 MB).

What is strange to me is that if I run an overnight test using Dataman & Onavo, with the phone plugged in and on a WiFi network, with the cellular data network on, there is almost always a large amount of data transmitted via the cellular network and the WiFi connection simultaneously.

If I do the same overnight test, with cellular data off, there is never a large amount of data transmitted over the WiFi network.

I have tried this overnight multiple times with the same results.

The problem, therefore, at least in my case, is multifold:

1) The phone should not even be using the cellular network at all because it is connected to power and on WiFi.

2) There shouldn't be any data to be transferred in the first place. The only apps in the dock are Dataman and Onavo, no push, no fetch, no open Safari pages, Store set to not use cellular data, etc., etc., etc.

I have only been turning cellular data on for the overnight tests and, rarely, only briefly as needed during the day. There is no legitimate data to be transferred.

3) There is no large unexplained data transfer of any kind unless cellular data is on - it never happens when the phone is on WiFi only – never. Sometimes I go for several days without activating cellular data.

Please: Has anyone else done similar tests, and, if so what are your results?

Interesting results. Have you tried leaving wifi off and cellular data on? Perhaps some sort of feedback is occurring between the two data paths.

My own experience with data billing raises a different question. I have four iPhones: 1 power user, 2 frequent users, 1 light user. A few months ago, upon realizing that the light user had never consumed more than 150mb/mo in over three years, in spite of being on an unlimited plan, i switched her to the 200mb/mo option. I didn't tell her about the change, the apps and usage of her phone remained the same, and yet within the first week (out of four) I received a data overage msg and ultimately was charged for over 800mb in that first month on the restricted plan. Last month i switched up to a 2gig plan and was tagged for 1.5gb. This month I am only 6 days in and have been charged for 2.4gb so far. The other 3 phones are much more heavily used, yet burn up no where near this amount of data. Clearly the problem i am experiencing is unrelated to the way the phone has been used. I will be calling for a refund, experimenting with periodically turning off cellular data, and keeping an eye out for posts from users on competing carriers. I hope Apple is taking this seriously.

phone stays plugged in at night. I left my phone plugged in last weekend and a 152 mb packet mysteriously appeared! The data collection is a concious effort by att with 3g instead of wireless otherwise it would go wireless.

i reset the data usage on the phone and yes...it went...

dont be ridiculous? im not, maybe the phone came loaded with 237 mb of progs, however I have not loaded any extra...actually i got rid of some...8 pics, no vids or music. btw according to app manifesto, the overall average app memory size is just under 9 megabytes...

I never said it was an iphone problem...simply i can only speak about mine as iphone is what i have...however that further illustrates the problem as being att.

i dont use facebook on the phone, exchange, or i stream...no conscious cloud usages...never approved for install.

EXACTLY!!!!!!! for years our data was NEVER over ~50 mb...the same proved true when we switched to att for 3 mos. then all of a sudden we all are going over the 200 mb plan...the only response from att is ...you guessed it "buy more data or pay the overages.." NO ONE at att can tell you a.) if the data is coming or going, b.) what it is. c.) how to stop the transfers with out turning off cellular data...

there is no doubt that this is a concious effort on atts part to chum more money...1mm people going over @ $15 a pop = $15mm...nice bonus for the execs and share holders....

"Have you tried leaving wifi off and cellular data on? Perhaps some sort of feedback is occurring between the two data paths."

I haven't, but I definitely will as soon as convenient. Thanks for the excellent idea.

I'll let you know the results, whatever they may be.

Interesting this. I am in the UK using O2 and have only just started experiencing the same thing. Up to 4 days ago my average daily usage for the past 6 months has been less than 10mB per day with a maximum during Christmas of 27mB. Then in the last 4 days my usage has soared to 97, 83, 96, 82mB each day. That has pushed me over my limit of 500mB per month. I have not changed my browsign habits which as you can guess are pretty limited. I have followed gudance here and turned off everything that could speak to the outside world but the outgo keeps happening. So, like you, I would like a solution please Apple.

I just got my bill. The data usage there does not match what was uploaded..... Granted, I tracked with my data monitor programs almost every day for the last few weeks and it uploaded 1-2GB per DAY. I should have seen a 60GB data on my bill. It was nowhere near that. I'm guessing that it must be some sort of tracking by Apple or some other nefarious thing where AT&T gave away the keys to the kingdom. Freedom and privacy are ideas that corporations apparently consider flexible to their goals.

D

HAs anyone else noticed that dataman shows much higher usage than onavo - onavo shows a split of data activity and it is broadly what I would have expected for me with some facebook, some MS exchange etc. Whereas dataman shows about 20 times the usage (but doesnt give a split). So if Onavo is doing the right thing then the extra data is not going through any app that I have open. Is there any way of getting dataman to show a split so we can see where the data is being used? (incidentally, dataman agrees with the iphone's own usage recorder and also the service provider)

My experience over the course of more than a year now has been that, when I'm using it correctly,* Dataman is pretty close to the iPhone's internal counter and to the numbers reported by my service provider. I haven't used Onavo yet, but if there is a great discrepancy, I would trust Dataman.

_____

*To properly track data, Dataman must be run when the phone is first powered on, and again right before any reboot/shut-down, to close out its records. The latter is especially true if you are not running Dataman in precise tracking mode. It has also been my experience that if I haven't brought Dataman to the foreground in a long time and the phone runs out of RAM, iOS will kill it and it will stop tracking, so I make it a habit to run Dataman a couple of times per day to make sure it's still going in the background. If I do those things, it's numbers agree fairly well with the built-in counter.

Thanks chcn. Yes it looks like a network problem - so far my company O2 is blaming Apple although they have permitted me to make a formal complaint so we will see. I am only asking them to re-instate 300mB of data allowance so I suspect it would be cheaper to concede.

Ok discussion group heres a new one, I decided to shut of my Iphone and start using my old phone not a smart phone with no data with ATT and just got my bill and guess what I still was charged for Data usage only

$2.00 but still what? The phone originally was a piece of crap but am just trying to wait out my contract.

Which is another thing thats just makes me fume, putting up with all this and being under contract. Where in

the contract does it say they can do whatever they want. Well remember MCI World Com?

As noted earlier in this thread--- the metrics of how things work as oppossed to what you use don't mesh together to formulate the actual usage.

First, the data is transmitted over air and along with this medium comes inherent challenges. The assumptions are if you send a 15kb message that you are billed for 15kb? I seriously doubt this is or ever has occurred.

Secondly, how the carrier bills isn't widely revealed and hidden behind the beaurcratic shield.

Thirdly, the metrics on the iPhone and Dataman may or may not truly capture the real picture. As is often the case with billing software the capture of what a user consumes vs. what they think or should have consumed may be very different.

The variables and unknowns are defintely worthy of causing concern. There are other concerns I've already posted and will not rehash until or if and when either known expertise such as a member from Black Hat has already written about vulnerabilities or someone with credible evidence such as the last find on privacy from CarrierIQ's rootkit.

The FCC and AT&T have exhibited a deaf ear and Apple hasn't ponied up either other than after the fact of discovery, they stop or change their policy.

At end of 4Q2011, I purchased two new iPhone 4s's and set them up identically. Only model difference is color unless there's a version of hardware I don't know about. His and Her's iPhone with His (me) expecting to be the highest volume user and HERS expected to be nil. HER usage is approximately 8 time greater than mine. Difference is APPS (games) and Siri that she uses and I am more amiable to connecting to WiFi (FREE) because she doesn't take the time. BOTH of us using DataMan and I can't see issues and just loaded ONAVO and thanks to those that posted this-- interesting but too early to tell anything.