> they’ve disabled the user’s ability to turn off “auto-join” on iOS
How (and why) is it even possible for carriers?
Carriers ask phone makers for config changes all the time. It’s possible this is a new capability that was requested by certain carriers.
To be fair, it’s also possible that the OP and I are misinterpreting what’s going on. For instance, iOS syncs your preferences across devices. Perhaps there’s some bug that’s causing the wrong setting to propagate back to this person’s phone because their iPads, etc are still set to allow “auto join”.
This theory could be tested by signing out of iCloud before changing "auto-join".
This happened in India. So one day mobile data was quite slow on my non-Apple phone. I asked my friend to enable hotspot on his iPhone. We were stumped when we couldn't find the "Personal Hotspot" option at all in ios settings. Called Apple support who informed us that Hotspot option is only available if the carrier enables it. They asked us to contact the carrier.
We were outraged and thought the carriers in India had suddenly decided to charge us extra for this option. Or maybe just for iPhone users. (In india, no carrier charges us extra for this option - and that is how it should be right? We are already paying more according to the bandwidth (3g/4g/5g speeds) and they also already limit how much data we can download. Imagine being charged extra for the "privilege" of sharing your data and consuming it faster!). We were prepared to yell at the carrier if they wanted more money from us for this but their customer support explained to us that this is a common complain they have with Apple iPhones, and all we needed to do was add some more info in the mobile data settings, which she provided us.
That's when we realised that it is a very American / Apple thing because the US business model of mobile phone and carriers are very different from India. In the US, most mobile phones are sold through the carriers and Apple and its competitors have to work with them closely. Whereas in India, consumers purchase their mobile phones independent of the carrier.
Recently the term "consumer-friendly" became the synomym of "we shove it down your throat whether you like it or not!". If you wish to communicate some real user-friendly feature better find some other phrase. Reading "consumer-friendly" statements of providers makes me turn away and never look back.
See the above example. Hijacking the device we use for our daily operations, very important one with sensitive data, already in risk from multitude of origins, hijacking it remotely into some unknown channels along hidden organisational incentives is a very offensive and frightening move. The technology is not new and it is OPTIONAL for very long time. Shoving it down the throat is bad. Very bad.
(I am pretty disappointed with the population of the world that accepts anything from service providers for mostly marginal or never missed gains, accepting the elimination of choice. Providers feel they can get away with anything and became increasingly hostile.)
Having phones automatically and uncontrollably route via random 3rd party APs is a bad decision, but I didn't read GP as advocating for this.
In the US, at least, tampering with cell service risks getting the FCC involved, so very few people do it compared to WiFi hacking.
I'm very curious, for example, if the devices that connect to these APs are vulnerable to the WiFi client isolation bypass that was disclosed about a week ago.[1] That seems a lot scarier when there are potentially thousands of random people's personal phones connecting to the same WiFi infrastructure instead of a bunch of more or less trusted corporate devices in an office.
WiFi APs are not secure enough unless you're using another layer of security on top (a VPN, for instance). It's not a matter of trusting them to properly run a WiFi network. It's a question of if there's an additional layer of security on top. Is there?
This probably is "consumer-friendly" in the sense of "provides the outcome desired for most consumers".
Unluckily it is over and misused for things forced through regardless of wanted or not - but benefitial for the provider for sure -, being a routine misdirection (basicly bullshit) text.
The cycle of deception never ends. If a company misuses words, they'll do it again with new ones. We must resist by sticking to the plain meaning of words.
I really hope not.
They have chimed in to provide further context based on their personal experience. You’ve latched onto and have subsequently read way too much into two words that they used, and tried to offset your unjustified browbeating with “friendly remark”.
It works great, super speedy. Definitely better than the cell network during a game.
How do we know this? What's the security mechanism?
I wonder if those with the problem were to restart or reset their device, if they would still have the problem?
It’s intended as a consumer-friendly way to increase capacity in dense areas (like a sports stadium or mall) where the carrier’s cell towers don’t have enough capacity.
Wifi offloading is not new. AT&T helped invent these standards back in ~2009 when their network was getting crushed by massive increases in traffic as iPhone usage took off.
WiFi offload networks are configured as “Managed Networks” which are lower priority than any user-selected networks. You can disable them by turning off “auto-join”. (Also these WiFi offload networks are secure; you can’t spoof them).
However it appears that the original poster’s carrier (presumably Xfinity Mobile or Spectrum Mobile) has done something new - they’ve disabled the user’s ability to turn off “auto-join” on iOS. Some overzealous team is trying to lower their cellular costs. That’s because both Comcast and Spectrum rent capacity on Verizon Wireless towers, but their MVNO cellular service is not profitable unless their customers are using the cable company’s own WiFi fairly often.
However this (disabling “auto-join”) is a dumb move. It’s obviously problematic for users whose neighbors are broadcasting the [Xfinity WiFi or Spectrum Mobile?] SSID.
To my knowledge, no major carrier does this. If you’re on AT&T, T-Mobile, or Verizon, the “managed offload networks” can be easily disabled. And the major carriers are using higher-quality commercial WiFi networks for offload, not random home cable modems.