How do I prevent Personal Hotspot from automatically activating whenever a device decides to connect to my phone.

I completely agree, this way I cannot control my data usage and the maximum time my children watch Youtube. My router blocks my children after two hours of Youtube each day. So far this works out fine, until they discover the personal Hotspot feature. I am sure it won't take long until they do... It gives me the same feeling as the misleading 'Wifi assistance' feature that used to be switched on as a standard. Apple may very well have an interest in people using a lot of mobile data.

Then it could be a bug, since there are two locations for switching the personal hotspot on; One is in the central settings area. In my opinion this should be for anyone that has the password, regardless if they have an Apple account or Apple device at all. And then there is the setting in the 'Mobile Network' folder, which should work for switching devices with the same Apple ID on or off. If Apple would fix this I think all of the above people would be happy.

This is very clearly a security flaw. It allows other people, whom you generally trust, to abuse your LTE data plan while you are under the clear understanding that you have explicitly prevented them from doing so.

Mitigating this loophole by forcing families to create different Apple IDs, or by being religiously fanatical about turning off Bluetooth, or by forcing users to put their phones on airplane mode to prevent this from occurring is impractical and error prone.

Anybody who tries to argue that fact that this is not a security breach has their fingers in their ears and needs to remove them. Fix it Apple. Make this behavior optional, not mandatory. End of story.

For me, it's not the security issue, it's the expense with a limited data plan.

My non-tech savvy wife travels with her Macbook Pro and her iPhone SE. Both have the same AppleID. Wifi and Bluetooth are normally on with the iPhone. The iPhone connects to the car audio system through Bluetooth. When she arrives at her mother's, who doesn't have wifi, she'll turn on the Personal Hotspot, and surf the internet on her Macbook Pro. When done surfing, she'll turn off the Personal Hotspot. However, because of the Instant Hotspot "feature", the Personal Hotspot will automatically turn back on, thus incurring unnecessary charges.

While I realize that she could either turn off wifi or turn off bluetooth to disable the Instant Hotspot activation, this really doesn't seem like a natural solution. An on/off switch for Instant Hotspot activation seems like a better solution.

Turning off Bluetooth is not an option for me since my hearing aids are connected to my phone via BT. I think this is a terrible problem that Apple needs to solve.

We also have unlimited AT&T data plans that will become useless once the personal hotspot gets turned on.

Personal hot spot should never be turned on automatically. It's ridiculous.

Short answer: turn off bluetooth on your phone, do not charge your phone on a laptop that used the hotspot before while the laptop has no wifi.

This "feature" really is stupid.

I am using a prepaid data plan and only occasionally use the iphone as a hotspot - when I really need it. Therefore, my hotspot is generally switched off.

Recently, I was working on the train (presumably offline) and did not realize that the laptop automatically connected to the hotspot and was able to override the off-setting without me doing anything. What an idiotic behavior!

The laptop drew large amounts of data in the background, for which I then had to pay 50 bucks, even if I did not surf or anything and was not even aware that the connection existed.

After several support calls with apple and my service provider, which basically did not help as the root cause could not be identified, I stumbled upon this thread.

It seems I had bluetooth on on both devices exceptionally. On my laptop, bluetooth is always on, as I use such a mouse and keyboard at home and in the office. But on the phone, I usually have it turned off, but must have left it on because of some airdrop I did earlier.

Not sure when Apple changed this or whether this behaviour is designed this way. To me, it looks like a design flaw. When a user says: "No, I do not want to use the hotspot!" on his phone, why would an automatic behavior override this decision? Especially, as long as we still have data plans that are not unlimited in many countries.

The only option to prevent this is to not charge my iphone on my laptop when travelling (because of the usb-connection that would turn on the hotspot), and to have bluetooth switched off on my iphone. Or to be aware of this flaw and disable "wifi" everytime the laptop is not connected to a wife and close to the phone.

I have a similar problem except it's my kids racking up my bill. It ended up costing me over $100 in data overages in just one month 😩. The only thing I don't understand is, if my kids all have their own Apple ID, why are they able to override the turned off hotspot! I agree that this is totally a security problem and needs to be addressed somehow and fast.

No, it is a SERIOUS security problem because it leaves the hotspot open when the phone goes away.

How is it a security problem when you own and control both devices?

RAND this is not a configurable feature.

but it at least needs to be an opt-in vulnerability.

Yeah it is. Don't sign in to iCloud on 2 devices within Bluetooth distance of each other if you do not wish to share your hot spot.

Totally controllable. Totally opt-in.

I'm amazed at the tone of the replies here. Millions of people let their kids share their own Apple IDs.
Mobile data costs money. If a hotspot has the option to be authorised, it also needs an option to be de-authorised.
Yes means yes, no means no. Not maybe.

Well actually that wasn’t it.

From the phone itself:

Settings, General, Restrictions, On, scroll down to Allow Changes section, Cellular Data, check Don’t Allow Changes for both Cellular and Cellular Plan

My iphone 6 running iOS 11 in its wifi settings shows my iphone 7 running iOS 10 The 7 has personal hotspot off but if it is chosen in the wi-fi settings the 6 turns is on and automatically connects to the 7 without even requiring the password that is shown in the iphone 7 hotspot settings! I have tried to correct this for some time with no success. Today I found that turning off Bluetooth on either device removes the hotspot from the wi-fi settings on the iphone 6.

I have turned it off on the 6 since it has a headphone jack I can use wired headphones. The 7 of course has no headphone jack. Thanks so much apple for this needless change! So I have chosen to leave bluetooth on in the 7. No I do not want to use the tiny breakable and easily lost headphone jack dongle that came with the 7. Pehaps this is helpful to others as a workaround but the real issues are 1. Why can one device turn on the hotspot of another when it is OFF by choice? 2. Why is there a password when it is not required? 3. How to make that the password is required before access can happen?

See if this reply by Ian Parkinson is of assistance

My iphone 6 with ios8.1 is always transmitting personal hotspot even if turned off. How do i stop the leakage?

I don't see that behavior at all.

I turn off Personal Hotspot and attached devices can no longer see the Hotspot and connect to LTE or other WiFi if available.

Are you sure of what you are reporting?

It's not a security hole at all. The only devices that can connect to your phone via the Instant Hotspot feature are other devices that are using your Apple ID and password. If you don't want those devices accessing your phone, change their Apple ID.

NiKD

I just tried this on my iPad to connect to my iPhone using Personal Hotspot.

As JimHdk wrote above this is what happened:

With iPhone Personal Hotspot on, I can see the connection via my iPad.

when I shut off iPhone Personal Hotspot, I can still see the connection via my iPad - however, once I turn off iPad Wi-Fi and turn it on again, the iPhone network is lost to the iPad

Same thing happens when I try to log on to the Personal Hotspot from Macbook via Wi-Fi.

With iPhone Personal Hotspot on, I can see the connection via my Macbook.

With iPhone Personal Hotspot off, I can see the connection via my Macbook but it drops off of the choices once I refresh it.

To add another data point, here's my experience. I have an iPhone 6 with iOS 8.1.2.

I briefly set up and tested Personal Hotspot to link my Macbook Air (10.10) with the phone. I then turned OFF Personal Hotspot on the phone.

However, my MBA still shows my personal hotspot's name in the Wifi menu. When I try to join that network, nothing happens (it remains connected to my regular home wifi).

My Macbook Pro next to me (also 10.10), which has never joined the hotspot, does not show it at all in the Wifi menu.

So my guess is that it remains as an option to computers which have connected to it in the past, but it will not "activate" if it's turned off on the phone.

Matt