The iPhone 5 uses Cellular Data over WiFi?

So, you are saying, that even with Siri off, Siri was sending data? Did you reset the phone after turning Siri off? It might have been active in the background even after having been switched off.

No, switched Siri off yesterday after finding out she decided to have a little chat with someone the other night without me telling her she could:) When my new monthly use charges start in a week I'm going to turn cellular on again, turn Siri back on and see what happens. Right now don't have enough data left this month to experiment on what happened. Thanks for the help. Just disturbing to see a lot of people having this same problem of cellular data use, and I believe many if not most not being their fault, because it has happened to both my wife and I a couple of times. Owned a 3g for 4 years, never had that problem. Wife started having problems when there was a software upgrade last year. Now has happened to me a couple of times since getting my iPhone 5 a couple of months ago. Again thanks for the help.

I got the iPhone 5 last November and it worked as usual until about a week ago when AT&T notified my I was approaching my 200 MB limit. I usually use (download) 50 MB a month of data while on the cell network, so I called and got the next 200 MB free. Within a few days I got another message, and so got another 200 MB free.

I looked at my account detail on the computer and could see that all the data was sent from the iPhone without my knowledge. No data was received. I can only wonder what data was sent, why so much, by what feature, and to whom for what purpose. I spent some time turning off all the features of the iPhone that could receive or send data, but I saw so few that could send data.

You may want to check your usage detail on the iPhone. My ATT usage (from their web site) always says "sent", but my iPhone usage shows the vast majority of data was received. I don't think the ATT web site shows anything but "sent", so it's misleading. Nevertheless, sorry to hear you're a member of this club. It's an odd problem. I use about 5 times more data than I used to, and my spouse's iPhone 5 data usage stayed the same.

Last night I turned off everthing I could find that might send or receive data. This morning the phone's cellular usage showed nothing sent or received. But -- the website showed that at 11:10 PM last night, 750 KB was sent.

That is a minor sending, but has happened every night for the past week or two according to the website. So last night after turning data off, I waited until 11:15 PM and saw no usage activitiy posted on the website.

Which leaves questions:

1. How could the website show data sent when the phone does not?

2. How could the phone send data when that function was turned off as much as I could see?

3. Why does the website show the 11:10 PM data transmission last night, when it was not there are 11:15 PM?

Anyway, my confidence in my trusty iPhone is shaken. And I don't know how useful the iPhone will be with so much turned off.

I can't help too much with Q1 and Q2, but on Q3 I believe AT&T states that the times are approximate and updated periodically. My experience has been when the times are posted (which isn't real-time) they are exact.

I share your concern about the usefulness. My old iPhone, when I closed an app, it was closed. Now, it looks closed, but is still running in the background. If Apple is suggesting that an app can transfer data after I "closed" it, they need to give an option or setting that allows me to really close it when I'm done and not have to pull up another ridiculous screen and close it for real. This feels like Microsoft.

The other issue we are having is the transfer of cellular data when connected to WiFi. Again, the default setting should be cellular data is off or secondary when connected to WiFi, but I have listened to Pandora with my iPhone sitting next to my WiFi antenna, and I got nailed for 350 MB of cellular data usage during that time period.

My iPhone 5 must also be transferring cellular data when on WiFi. That is the only way to explain such large bursts of data.

Out of the house, I maybe look at Maps now and then. In the house all day, where I download apps and read news sites, the phone is on the Airport Extreme.

One day into my new billing cycle and I'm already at 50% data used...gone from wifi for about 1 hour.

So while I do know that this is an Apple problem and not just the carriers I wanted to say that I finally found a solution that worked for us personally. After filing our FCC complaint and then going back and forth with AT&T's executive office forever (who just wanted to blame me for using 3GB every 3 days, even though this was astronomical compared to our usage over the last 10 years with them) they finally let us out of our contract with no cancellation fees. We then switched to Verizon and bought two new iPhone 5's to replace our months old AT&T ones. We really had no choice but to stick with Apple since we run a business that has Apps in the App store, so I was very nervous the problem would remain.

So far in our first month and using our phones like we used to we've only used 0.7 GB between both phones. The crazy data leakage has stopped and I'm keeping my fingers crossed it stays that way. I'm hoping for no more frustrating "surprises" even though I know there are people on this forum who are with Verizon. Wishing everyone the best of luck and I highly recommend filing an FCC complaint against AT&T if you are so inclined. It's the only way we got anything even addressed.

If it's an Apple problem, then why did switching from AT&T to Verizon cure it?

If it's an AT&T problem, then why did it not happen to me for four years until a couple of weeks ago after an iOS update?

Maybe it was a combination of what the iOS update did to AT&T.

I have had no cellular data usage since I turned off Cellular a day ago. Except when I turned it on for a moment, and a few KB went back and forth, just the phone and AT&T saying hello to each other. So I think I will leave Cellular off until and when I need to use it. This can't be what either Apple or AT&T intended.

OK. As I strive for an answer or at the very least an explanation, I have discovered the following.

Last night at the house I was on WiFi. I had 6 apps to update on my iPhone 5 running 6.1.2. Before I started the update process I wrote down my usage figures. 83.4 MB sent and 1 GB received.

Then I started the update process. After each App had finished I looked at my usage and my sent amount increased after each app. Keep in mind I AM ON WIFI. After all the updates were done, my sent data increased by 4.8 MB. Let me add thjat during one update, I turned cellular data off and saw no increase. Received stayed the same. This is a problem.

On the way to work this morning I checekd my usage. 88.2 MB sent and 1 GB received. I let my phone sit in the seat next to me and didn't touch it. It checked email, etc. I used a whopping 500 MB on a 40 min ride to work. 1/2 GB in 40 min not even touching the phone. This too, is a problem.

SOmething is wrong here. It don't know if it's Apple or AT&T, but there is an issue with the iPhone 5 and 6.1.2. MAybe it has to do with an early production model of the phone. Mine was pourchased when it was released.

This is *not* a hardware fault. It is happening to iPhone 4 and iPhone 4S, not just the i5.

My iPhone 4 worked fine on iOS4. It worked fine on iOS5 and only at iOS6 did I start experiencing many problems. I have since bought an i5 and that phone exhibits EXACTLY the same faults as my iPhone 4 did. The problem is iOS6 pure and simple.

I'll buy that since it seems before the 6.1.2 updtae, everything was fine.

It's too bad Apple won't allow us to roll back to iOS 6.1 just to see if that makes a difference. Now, I can't even restore to 6.1.2. Apple will only ALLOW 6.1.3 to be installed.

I'm a very faithful Apple supporter. I have been since 1988. But this is trying my patience.

While on the subject of data usage, I amazed that Apple doesn't provide a way for users to see what apps are using the most data to help users with problems like these. I can see that on the way to work, I used 500 MB of data, but why? What was my phone doing to use that much data. I have no way to tell. Sure, I can download apps to do this, but why not build it in? One app I downloaded reported that Apple Services has used 2.3 GB of data. What is this? And if I someone has a data plan of 1 GB, how in the world are they staying within that?

My favorite explanation by AT$T for my big data usage is that LTE uses more data when it downloads a page. WHAT? No. A web page has a sizw, say 800K. That does not change whether I am on OS X, 3G or LTE. LTE will just download the page faster than 3G. The website doesn't detect if someone is using LTE and serve up a larger page.

I used 500 MB and didn't touch my phone! It sat on the seat next to me. If I'm not careful conspiracy theories start to form in my head. Maybe this is planned. AT&T gets calls, tells people it's how they are using the phone or that it's because of LTE and then upsells them to an ever larger data package. Then after several months a fix appears! Magic. In the mean time AT$T has sold thousands of upgraded data plans.

STUPID.

I guess it started with me with 6.1.2 but it took awhile to notice, until AT&T said I was using up my 200 MB, twice in a couple of weeks. I think it was a week ago that 6.1.3 came out, but it didn't make any difference.

Now I have got the data usage completely under control -- a few days ago I turned off Cellular. I will only turn it on as needed, when I am out of the house AND need to do something with it.

Certainly turning off Cellular Data is an option. But...is it what we bought an iPhone for?

I don't want to have to turn on Data, check my email, turn off data.

Turn on data, check a movie time, turn off data.

Turn on data, check email, turn off data.

Turn on data, find directions, turn off data.

No. Apple needs to acknowledge the problem and fix it. Not have me adjust my usage to work around a poorly implemented iOS update.

I would offer that you don't have your data usage under control, it has you under control.