Ios6 causing excessive data usage?

looks like we all need to email the boss...

<Link Edited by Host>

Anyone else on AT&T have a 7MB or so unexpected transfer between 12:00 - 1:00 AM EST on Nov 27? This is a small one - but hit all three of our families devices despite us being in 3 different cities. No shared photostreams or anything else.

New billing cycle - my wife has turned cellular data back on. We have three phones on AT&T - my daughter and I have unlimited data, my wife has a 200MB plan that she has blown through each of the past two months since upgrading to ios 6 - never done that before. My wife has turned cell data back on as we've entered a new billing cycle. All three of our devices showed a 7M transfer (shown as data sent on ATT usage report) on Nov 27 between 12:00 am and 1:00 am this morning. None of us were using our devices. The transfers were not the same size - but all between 7 and 7.1 M. My wife and I are running 6.0.1 and have switched off all the icloud cellular data settings we could find. For all three of us, we were inside a wifi zone - my device was plugged in.

Interestingly, both my daughter and I who are on unlimited have never had the huge data usage spikes that my wife has had on her 200 MB plan.

Peter

Just adding my voice to the outcry - wife never went over 200mb before per month on ATT, upgraded to 4s, now she's blowing past 200mb and she NEVER uses video/podcasts/media unless she's home on wifi, and even then it's sparing.

Adding my voice as well. I'm with Vodafone Australia. After using next to no data with my iPhone 4 with them over the past 2 years - I find a substantial excess usage (over my 1.5gb allowance) after just 12 days of my 1st full iPhone 5 month. On investigation, Vodafone say it is related to my iTunes access. This does not make sense in relation to my limited actual usage.

Are you on iOS 6.0 or 6.0.1 ?

I am on 6.0.1 - my iPhone has only ever been on this (got it after the 'update' came out).

My iPod Touch (4th gen) was on iOS5 previously. It was upgraded directly to 6.0.1 after the 'update' came out; it did not go to 6.0 first.

Note that my iPod Touch, aside from consuming large quantities of wifi data now, also only lasts about half as long as it used to on battery - presumably because it's doing so much transmission that it never did when it was on 5.

FYI, sad but true, and Apple acknoledged the data leaks...

http://consumerist.com/2012/11/30/for-once-att-being-incompetent-is-good-news/

FYI, I also use a Sony P Tablet, on AT&T's 4G, $30/mo. for 3 GB. data. Haven't had any problems like this data over runs.

FYI, I turned off everything on my iPhone5!!! For three days only using wi-fi at home. Reset usage and for three days all at 0. Went to AT&T to show them as I am at my limit in the first 5 days of plan. Had the rep turn on celluar data and then go to usage. Right in front of him it started downloading. Ended up within 10 seconds with 169 MB received and 122mb sent. His eyes got bigger than silver dollars. So, turning all off does not work, cause when you do need celluar data, somehow all the time it's been turned off, it's storing info to add when you turn celluar data back on!!!!!! Tired of the same old thing, "it's someones elses problem"......Have now retained my attorney to get this crap fixed on my phone. Good luck......Nobody wants to take responsibility!!

Here in the UK, I'm on my second Iphone 5. Took the first one back as Apple, O2 and Phones4U told me it was probably a hardware problem with the wifi. Well guess what? Brand new hand set, same old problem. I can force it to join wifi at home and at work (did this by manually entering connection codes as 'Other') so at least I'm not using data from my monthly plan up there. But on the commute in between (thankfully i have no life otherwise, sigh) I am finding that the phone is racking up HUGE data usage. And I mean absolutely gigantic. In fact it's used more in 4 days than my Iphone 4s used in 3 months. By the end of day 1 with my new phone I'd used 1/2 my monthly data plan, simple by opening an email. Utterly ridiculous.

I've been monitoring data usage every few minutes over the past few days and this is what I've discovered. When cellular is off, no transmission of data occurs. When I'm on wifi, no transmission of data occurs. When mobile data is on, but 3G is off, no leak occurs. Switch on 3G, however, and the data sent/recieved starts rocketing up. Even with all background apps closed. Even on sleep mode, in my pocket, doing nothing.

So the problem can only be with the way the phone responds to having 3G selected to 'on'.

It seems when 3G is on, it is constantly communicating with the servers, whether you've opened any apps, whether you've chosen to or not. To be clear: All notifications are off. Email push is off. Icloud is deleted (which reduced data usage massively. If you still have icloud get RID of it). Neither Itunes or anything else is selected to pull data. Also gmail, deleted. (also helped massively). Location services off. Everything, even ad tracking is off. But it still pulls data. Where from?!! It seems when 3G is on it is constantly trading data with the server, racking up huge amounts of data sent and recieved.

Happens with my colleague's 4S on IOS6.01 too. The problem is not the handset, it's the operating system.

IOS6 is the biggest failure yet for Apple, buggy and awful. (not to mention how terrible maps are). If Apple don't fix this MASSIVE problem soon i think a legal worldwide class action case can't be far off. I'd support it. If you pay £400 for a handset you expect it to work, not to be so afraid of switching 3G on that you feel unable too. the phone is useless without email push or internet connection. It's the opposite of a smart phone. I might as well ressurect my old Nokia.

Apple needs to sort this out right now.

I've been a lifelong Apple fan but after his fiasco 'll NEVER buy Apple again. IOS6 is an absolute disaster.

Patch It, fix it, whatever, just sort it out apple. Pretending it's not happening is not going to make this go away.

As for this phone? Until I see a fix, it's going in the bin.

jus added a galaxy S3 and a Note II. don't like using my iPhone 5 or iPad 3. I worry everyday that my sister's iPad Mini is gonna run out of data plan in less than a week when we pay for a full month based on her habits she never goes above 250 MB/month, which was her limit on the iPad 2 att she had. Do I have to move all of us to the S3 and Note II???

Just adding my voice to this nightmare situation too....still find it hard to believe that Apple have not acknowledged this problem yet!! Up until ios 6 and 6.0.1 I was a massive Apple fan, they could do no wrong in my eyes but unfortunately after this last software update that feeling is fading fast!! I'm in the UK and have an iphone 4S on the O2 network, I pay for 1GB of data every month, up until ios 6/6.0.1 this would easily last the whole month, last month it was all used up within three days and this month is an even bigger joke....my data allowance was renewed at 00:00hrs on 13th December and at 16:59hrs on 13th December I received a text message from O2 saying I had almost used all of my data allowance for the month!!! Now I'm sure you'll all agree regardless of how heavy a user you are there is no way this should be possible!! Not using my phone anymore now than I was for the 13 months prior to the software update and never had an issue before!! Sort it out Apple, you risk losing a LOT of customers if this isn't fixed or at least acknowledged soon!!! Seriously considering a Samsung Galaxy!!!

On 29 Nov I added my voice. I am now offering the solution that Vodafone Australia offered.They suggested 2 steps.

STEP 1 Settings > iCloud > Documents & Data > Use Cellular Data > Set to OFF position.

STEP 2 Settings > iTunes & App Stores > Use Cellular Data > Set to OFF position.

That's it.

Using these, has stopped the data leakage on my phone. I have used just 40.5mb in the last 7 days without loss of functions that are relevant to me.

ALSO, here is a link to a Sydney Morning Herald video on the issue of battery life offering a fix to that issue.

Fixing iPhone 5's battery and data drain bugs

Following these steps has restored my faith.

I'm not sure if the problem is remedied or not. I have also switched off "use cellular data" on icloud documents and data, as well as itunes & app stores as mentioned above (did this about a month ago) - I'm also on 6.0.1 on an iphone 4s in the US on AT&T wireless with an unlimited plan. In normal usage - as I've been doing for the few years - my usage this past month on cellular was down around 150MB as it has always been. My wife unfortunatley now keeps all cellular data off on her iphone - only using it on wifi - so I can't comment on whether her system is working or not.

Are others still having this problem?

Peter

I wasn't all that scientific in my approach but I removed my iCloud account, upgraded to the latest iOS 6.0.1, stopped using and deleted the Podcast app, restored my iCloud account and starting using Downcast for podcasts and my usage has gone back to normal. I've used like 800 MB over the last 8 weeks which is pretty normal for me. ATT removed all of the excess data charges as well so I have nothing to complain about. Although, I would have liked to see Apple communicate to their loyal users better. I'm actually quite surprised that this hasn't turned out to be another thing like "Antenna Gate".

Al-