Recently a person found their mobile phone had chewed up around 241 GB of data on their Telstra plan. They woke up to find 141 messages from Telstra indicating they'd exceeded their 60GB of data. Each message was to indicate they were getting another 1 GB for $10. Nearly $2,000 of excess data.
This happened on April 1st and no, it wasn't an April fools joke.
Whilst it wasn't possible to identify all the apps which used the data, since many of the unused apps were deleted to clean up their system, the one app that stood out was Fox Sports. The Fox Sports app had reported it had used 75 GB of data. Of the 75 GB, 74 GB was used in the background.
There's a couple of issue here.
1. Make sure you check how much data your apps are using. If you're using an Android based mobile you can usually check the data usage per app.
2. You would think Telstra would have some limit on the amount of addition 1GB purchases that automatically apply before a person has to manually intervene. It appears this isn't the case. Bill shock is potentially a huge problem.
3. The data usage on a 4G network which can run at up to 150 Mbps can consume theoretically 15 MB per second. In one minute that's 900 MB or nearly a GB. Just one minute to consume nearly a GB. In an hour that's 48 GB.
4. How could the Fox Sports app possibly consume 75 GB of data in a matter of hours? This data usage was overnight and noticed in the morning. Something appears to be seriously wrong.
The person has now removed all unwanted apps just in case any of the apps were causing a problem. It is always be possible a malicious app had hijacked the mobile phone and given others access to Fox Sports and other apps. Without further information and in the short time available to check the mobile phone what actually happened was hard to ascertain.
What is important is to be aware that with Telstra you can end up with bill shook with excess data being automatically charged up to tens if not hundreds of gigabytes.
With the Fox Sports app turn the ability to run the app in the background off. If you don't know something is running it could be very costly.
Kelvin Eldridge
www.OnlineConnections.com.au
This happened on April 1st and no, it wasn't an April fools joke.
Whilst it wasn't possible to identify all the apps which used the data, since many of the unused apps were deleted to clean up their system, the one app that stood out was Fox Sports. The Fox Sports app had reported it had used 75 GB of data. Of the 75 GB, 74 GB was used in the background.
There's a couple of issue here.
1. Make sure you check how much data your apps are using. If you're using an Android based mobile you can usually check the data usage per app.
2. You would think Telstra would have some limit on the amount of addition 1GB purchases that automatically apply before a person has to manually intervene. It appears this isn't the case. Bill shock is potentially a huge problem.
3. The data usage on a 4G network which can run at up to 150 Mbps can consume theoretically 15 MB per second. In one minute that's 900 MB or nearly a GB. Just one minute to consume nearly a GB. In an hour that's 48 GB.
4. How could the Fox Sports app possibly consume 75 GB of data in a matter of hours? This data usage was overnight and noticed in the morning. Something appears to be seriously wrong.
The person has now removed all unwanted apps just in case any of the apps were causing a problem. It is always be possible a malicious app had hijacked the mobile phone and given others access to Fox Sports and other apps. Without further information and in the short time available to check the mobile phone what actually happened was hard to ascertain.
What is important is to be aware that with Telstra you can end up with bill shook with excess data being automatically charged up to tens if not hundreds of gigabytes.
With the Fox Sports app turn the ability to run the app in the background off. If you don't know something is running it could be very costly.
Kelvin Eldridge
www.OnlineConnections.com.au
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