How do I disable xfinity wifi?

When the Xfinity Profile first appeared back in 2016, a Reddit thread determined that what it did was to provide - "The profile is necessary in order to establish the security certificate for the RADIUS authentication on the user end."

https://www.reddit.com/r/apple/comments/42xd19/xfinity_wifi_profile_question/

But that thread does not post the profliie either. In the original email from Comcast in 2016, it was described as a "Security Profile." Which bears this out.

Of course, all of this becomes particularly interesting now that as an Xfinity Internet customer, you automatically become an Xfinity Cellular customer! (Last month's Xfinity bill insert).

One assumes that Apple is looking at this "feature" in direct relationship to "Handoff." -- the "seamless" transition from one device to another from one type of communications link to another.

Put another way -- this is making device usage "thoughtless" - Apple will continue to decide for you that you really meant Butter, when you typed Batter.

It is all about removing personal choice from device usage -- in the name of "User Friendliness."

Thanks again Diana. I get it. Boy what a firestorm in this thread about who is right and wrong lol! I don't blame either Apple or Comcast. They are both trying to do the right thing. The xifinity hotspot concept is ground breaking and novel. It's a great idea to have all their routers put out a customer/public signal. It is one big giant network and you can't expect Apple to accommodate their logic that would otherwise work well if it wasn't for "xfinity wifi".

It's all good. Maybe Comcast can put more logic in their client, but I doubt it, they want you on their network.

I can confirm that I'm having this problem and it's really annoying. If I tell it to "forget" the xfinitywifi network, it disables it for the time being, but then it will still connect to the next time I come to one. In other words, "it doesn't remember to forget".

The problem happens is that this often happens while I'm moving around (driving, walking, biking). It will connect to a really marginal xfinitywifi site, where the signal is so weak I lose my network connection because it tries to go over that instead of the LTE network.

Has anyone found a way to fix this - permanently?

iPhones connect to it whether or not they have an Xfinity profile (so do Macs). It is just an 802 network that is available for connection. Xfinity have every right to broadcast networks, it is after all one of the things they exist to do. A phone can 'forget' the network, user choice.

You can only "Forget" the Xfinity WiFi if you are not moving around.

There is something about Apple's technique for picking a WiFi network, which will pick an "un-remembered" Xfinity hot-spot, even when in the presence of other "known" WiFi hotspots.

Every time I return to my apartment, and my own 2.4 and 5gig WiFi, I find that I have to disassociate from my neighbors Xfinity WiFi, so that I can use my own. "Forget this network" has no effect as soon as I move beyond my own apartment and into an area where there is an Xfinity Hot-spot. I find that I have connected to an Xfinity network "again." This is especially true when the Xfinity Network is the only WiFi in the area. I am simply joined to it by the iPhone -- forgotten or not. (The Xfinity WiFi networks no passwords.)

Comcast automatically creates an Xfinity Hot-spot on every router it rents to an Xfinity Internet customer. The custome has no choice -- if they don't want it, the customer has to call Comcast "Customer Service" to disable the shared Hot-spot if they want to opt-out.

Yes, I understand what Comcast is doing and why. What I don't understand is why IOS on my iPhone and iPad constantly connect to an Xfinity hot-spot even though IOS has been told to forget that network.

Not true, it can be opted in or out at setup, which is usually done by the customer. Apple can not decide which network you should use, that is your choice. Apple treats all networks exactly the same, no favoritism.

Setup is the point in time after you open the box it came in and make it work, I guess you never read the instruction manual, the hotspot feature can be disabled then, after that Comcast assistance is required.

You are not alone in this. I too am having this problem and it's really, really annoying. When I'm traveling with my iPhone and using cellular service everything works fine until I get near a free Xfinity wifi hot spot. Then my phone tries to connect to what's usually a very weak signal because the street is usually far away from the modem offering service and everything hangs until I either turn off WIFI or the bad connection times out. If I'm driving there are often dozens of small local hotspots along my path but I pass thru their limited area before the connection is of any use but not too long for my iPhone to try and hang up. This happens almost every day and many times a day. It's annoying and Comcast won't even admit that there's a problem here. Sure I can forget the network but as soon as I'm within range of another hotspot the same thing happens. Turning off wifi on my phone while driving is dangerous and so I must pull over. I could just turn off wifi before getting in the car but then gps location accuracy for Google Maps, Apple Maps, Waze is affected. It's annoying and makes me hate using my iphone. I've called Comcast dozens of times and they never offer a solution other than info to turn off my home hotspot which isn't a problem because I can prioritize my personal network. I'm going to start exploring other service providers but so far I've been stuck as only Comcast has fast internet in my area. I sure wish Apple would go to bat for their iPhone users who are affected like this to get Xfinity to offer an app or such with a switch to turn off their free wifi connection unless there is intention to use it..

"I could just turn off wifi before getting in the car but then gps location accuracy for Google Maps, Apple Maps, Waze is affected."

This is not quite true. If you have no WiFi connection, then you have no ability for Apple's "Location Services" to use WiFi to "triangulate" your position! However, every time you pass and access one of those Xfinity hot-spots, Location Services is performing that "triangulation" process. So Xfinity is a double edged sword here. And yes, this identify/connect process takes only a couple of packets, i.e. fractions of a second.

Actual GPS locating requires that your iPhone have a "clear view of the sky," i.e. not inside the car or building or even under trees. The GPS radio signal is extremely low power and easily blocked. If you want to verify this simply download one of the GPS location apps, which will tell you when you have a GPS signal and what your GPS coordinates actualy are.

The problem is NOT Comcast's. It is clearly Apple's.

Configuring your Comcast Access Point to NOT broadcast the Xfinity Hot-spot, only impacts the visibility of the Xfinity Hot-spot in your own home. Comcast's Xfinity Hot-spots are part of their advertised Internet offering. For Comcast to "deal with" the problem would require them to completely disable the Xfinity Hot-spot option for all their Internet Customers.

I suspect the problem/issue is that Apple is simply attempting to provide you with WiFi access whenever it is availablle. And since the Xfinity Hot-spots do not require any password to connect with, IOS quickly latches on to them. Every Xfinity hot-spot has a common SSID (Xfinity) which enables "roaming." (I.e. they all look like one big WAN, which in-fact they are!) If those Xfinity Hot-spots you are driving past are close enough together, you could have a "seamless" handoff from one Access Point to another. This is especially true for any internet service other than streaming -- which, depending upon buffer size, would likely "hicup." Web surfing, email, etc. all are asynchronous services designed to deal with network interruptions. (Note the similarlity here to Apple's "Handoff" process which allows Cellular calls/data to be routed over (nominally free) WiFi when available.)

The basic problem, as I see it, is NOT that IOS finds and connects to theses Xfininty hot-spots, but that it gives priority to maintaing a connection to them even when there are stronger WiFi signals available. It simply won't forget or ignore the network.

Setup is the point in time after you open the box it came in and make it work, I guess you never read the instruction manual, the hotspot feature can be disabled then, after that Comcast assistance is required.

Csound1 wrote:

Setup is the point in time after you open the box it came in and make it work, I guess you never read the instruction manual, the hotspot feature can be disabled then, after that Comcast assistance is required.

That may possibly be true today. It was not true 3+ years ago when I first got my Comcast modem-access point.

Your argument makes no sense. First, WiFi does not locate you buy using triangulation. It reports a location that is stored within the router and there is a database of these locations. It is the same thing for cell towers. Also despite the fact that GPS is low power it will reach inside a car.

How would it be Apple's fault that Xfinity has created a network that if you have their profile on your iPhone it will connect to the hotspot network that they have established and allowed automatic connection?

It is simpler than that, the Xfinity hotspots are open (standard 802) networks so anything that connects to a standard network will be able to connect to them, no profile required.

You can just turn "ask to join networks" on and say no when the network asking is an Xfinity hotspot.

Mine also don't, but that is because I don't let them. I do not have an Xfinity profile, but if a connection has previously been made to the Xfinity network (which has not happened) they will remember it and re-connect. I just keep "ask to join networks" switched on.

I understand how open networks work but several of the people in this thread have stated that their device connects to an Xfinity hotspot without logging in which would be different that one just displaying that it is available. I have never automatically joined any hotspot except trusted ones that I have logged onto. So again, how does the iDevice know that one person has Xfinity service and lets them autoconnect to the Xfinity hotspot when mine does not?