One person who definitely didn’t read our PSA on Wi-Fi Assist last September is San Francisco teenager Ashton Finegold. CBS News says that he is blaming the feature on a mobile phone bill for $2,021.07 as he racked up 144GB of data.
It turns out Ashton Finegold’s bedroom is one such place with a weak [Wi-Fi] signal. So while he thought he was still connected to his home Wi-Fi while surfing the web in his room, his iPhone was eating up more than 144,000 MB of data.
The piece notes that Finegold did receive a text message warning from his carrier, which he ignored …
Wi-Fi Assist is an iOS 9 feature that automatically uses mobile data when you have a poor Wi-Fi connection. By default, it is switched on – leading to a $5M class action suit against Apple. Apple issued a support document explaining exactly how the feature works in October of last year.
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“The piece notes that Finegold did receive a text message warning from his carrier, which he ignored ”
In other words, he didn’t say anything to his parents when he got the text, and when the parents got the bill, cried “it’s not my fault!”
Is it that hard to, as a parent, routinely check data use? I have the Verizon widget on my iPhone/Notification Center. I check frequently. This past cycle with the holidays, I was using more than usual, but had enough.
This is the problem with some parents. They give their child a device for which the parent is financially responsible for yet have no idea how they work or how to manage usage. It’s like giving a kid a Lamborghini not knowing how fast the car goes!
*A* text message? If he racked up 144GB, he got a hell of a lot more than one. And his parents would have had to ignore a hell of a lot of texts too if he was on their plan.
We live in a society that doesn’t take responsibility for their actions anymore. It is always someone else’s fault. I am with AT&T and I receive 3 messages (75%, 90%, 100%) for the main plan and then for each GB I go over. I monitor this with great frequency. Let’s say they had a 10GB plan, that means they would have ignored over 400 text messages stating information about the amount of data being used. Take responsibility for your actions and pay the bill, and stop crying to media about it.
The video in the article states that the SMS he received indicated he’d used 65% of his data plan at that point. The article doesn’t indicate how far into the billing cycle he received it.
From the [CBS News article](http://www.cbsnews.com/news/apple-iphone-wi-fi-assist-blamed-for-teens-2000-phone-bill/):
“Ashton Finegold didn’t think much of the text message he received from his mobile phone service saying that he was nearing his data limit.”
“Ashton Finegold didn’t think much of the text message…”
“Ashton Finegold **didn’t think**…”
*Problem Identified.*
And when Mommy and Daddy got that BIG $$$ Bill – they have to blame somebody since they won’t accept any responsibility for their progeny “not paying attention” to that text – they have to find somebody to blame it on . . . Wait – Apple has deep pockets. Let’s call our attorney and file a lawsuit against Apple. It’s all Apple’s fault! Problem solved!
American parents at their finest!
I didn’t read the part of them filing a lawsuit and ranting against Apple. The article pointed out that a feature in iOS went unnoticed and led to using too much data, but no one was blaming them in the way you paint it.
If “Wi-Fi Assist” can result in such a high usage charge why isn’t the feature defaulted to off (or rather why isn’t there a step in the initial set up process that educates the customer on how the feature works? IMO Apple should be liable for any charges until they implement such a step ..
If Mr. Finegold hadn’t received the text message then maybe, just maybe Apple should be liable. But only maybe. There’s also such a thing as taking responsibility for ones own actions. In this way anybody can just do about anything and blame another one for it. Doesn’t sound right in my book.
Apple should not be responsible for a change they make to their own software which they license out to others. It is up to the consumer to educate themselves before buying or updating to a new version of software. Wifi assist was working as intended in this instance. It would be nice if Apple mentioned how wifi assist worked upon fresh boot of iOS 9+, but they didn’t. It is like sunscribing to Netflix while on a capped home internet plan, and blaming Netflix for using up too much of your data allotment.
Don’t be stupid. It’s a useful feature.
Of course it’s a useful feature I’m not arguing otherwise. However if said feature is resulting in higher than expected data usage wouldn’t it be wise to educate the consumer on the presence of said feature? Apple didn’t hide Touch ID or Apple Pay in fact educated the customer pretty well on phone set up.
Would have been much better if they’d made it a feature that you had to turn on instead of on by default.
It’s absolutely a useful feature. Apple is about the user experience and WiFI Assist means that the user experience is good since cellular data can help fill in when WiFi gets weak. Meaning your web surfing isn’t interrupted, you can send emails, etc. That’s a GOOD thing.
I almost used up my data when I updated and couldn’t work out why. It was only when I saw a news price on this site I found out about wifi assist.
I think it definitely shouldn’t be switch on automatically, but given as an option.
Ashton Finegold is an idiot. Carriers always warn via text message and simply surfing the web doesn’t eat up 144Gb of data. What the hell is this guy doing.
-“It’s usually $250 a month — and this was over $2,000,” the teen’s father, Jeff Finegold, said-
What the h*, as if 250 a month is normal, acceptable monthly payment for a teen’s mobile subscription. This parent needs to have a serious talk with his son and needs his own brain checked as well.
Unless your also a parent of this child, you’re not in position to say what this parent *should* do. You’re in a position to say what you would do.
You’re kidding right? The parent is the one blaming Apple for this instead of the child and going to the public with that blame. He is correct, the parent needs to blame the kid for not paying attention to the SMS message and STFU for something that’s clearly their fault. They were getting SMS messages about this.
I’m not saying they’re (Niels) wrong, I’m saying unless they are the parent of that child I think it’s wrong to say what that parent should do. If Niels is a parent, they are free to say what they would do with their child. I think it’s out of place to say what other parents should do with children that aren’t theirs.
All the article says is that the Wi-Fi Assist is to blame for the data use. In the video and quotes, no one (not the parents, not the kid, no the author of the piece) is ranting that Apple is blame and has to pay for their bill. Wi-Fi Assist being to blame is partly true. The kid is also to blame (personal responsibility) for not realizing the signal switched over to LTE and you could argue the parents are to blame for not keeping close enough tabs on the data for a bill.
Things don’t have to be black and white. There’s room for nuance.
Though, I’m in now position to tell you what you should do… so. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
Geesh.. Who the hell are you to tell a parent what they should or shouldn’t spend on their own child?? Depending on income level, I’d say most parents have different feelings as to how much they feel is acceptable to spend.
I thought he meant the family plan bill was normally $250 a month, not just the son’s portion.
Also, I consider myself to be very tech-savvy. I didn’t realize that Wi-fi assist was on by default until I started reading articles about people going over their limits. I think it’s a great feature but maybe there should be an indicator that you are currently using LTE instead of wi-fi. If you see the wi-fi indicator there really isn’t any way to know that your using LTE, right?
I believe when you switch to Wi-Fi assist the indicator in the status bar changes from the wifi logo to the LTE/3G logo.
WiFi Assist isn’t the problem…it’s AFFLUENZA!!!
What could you possibly be doing to use up 144 GB of data on your phone? Streaming music 24 / 7?
I’ll take the past couple weeks were we were driving quite a bit more than usual, and one of my kids is a YouTube watcher. It was the holidays, I had, through various promotions, 5 bonus GB of data, on top of my 10 GB shared on 5 phones. Generally in the 7 GB/month range. This past month, with holidays, travel, etc. we broke 10 for the first time. I’m a pretty heavy user, my two daughters are next (though my YouTube watcher is certainly starting to challenge for top user) then my wife and mom are light.
Even my home internet, with 150 Mbps speed, 5 Macs, 4 Apple TVs, 3 iPads, and the 4 iPhones averaged about 600 GB/month – and that is because we don’t have cable/satellite, everything is streaming.
How one kid gets as much use is beyond me. Has to be using YouTube for music instead of much less data intensive apps.
Also, if Apple is at fault, then the carrier is equally at fault. They should have, for these extreme cases, called or emailed, like your credit card does when they identify potential fraud. But it isn’t in their best interest, it seems.
There are plenty of online movie sites where you can stream movies from, so mobile data can be definitely be used up. He could be using his iPhone to Airplay on a TV in his room. With a Kodi setup on my Mac I watch many hours of streaming movies a day. Maybe this kid has a Netflix account he’s using to watch movies, so I don’t think he’s doing anything wrong except he should have been checking to see if he was on WiFi or not. Torrenting files can take up an awful lot of bandwidth if he’s downloading/sharing high-quality movie files. I used to spend a lot of time on my paid newsserver to download or upload all sorts of stuff from applications to movies and we’re talking about hours and hours a day, every day.
Or he could be watching a lot of HD porn.
In the end, we’re responsible for our own actions. I have received texts from AT&T about data usage, and I didn’t ignore them. There is no excuse for this kid not taking the proper action. He should have to pay the entire bill. This is not Apple’s fault.
I would agree if they did not bury the wi-fi assist option underneath all your apps that you have that show up under cellular. And, if they told you about it for real. Hiding the button and then keeping mum about how it works and what makes it kick in means that Apple was hoping to pull a fast one and make billions off of customers who can’t hear their phone ring. If I am listening to music, I may not hear the text message ringer. If I am deaf and accidentally turn off vibrate, I will never know a text came in unless I just happen to stop what I am doing and go to the home page. This is a crappy move for Apple to do, and I expect better from them! Just because Teenager who is hearing, got caught does not get Apple of the hook because I find that way too many disabled people who need the help, do not sue when they should because it is a huge deal for them to just get through all the hoops so that they can sue. Thanks!
Still this story makes me laugh. I was very disappointed that Apple had this function auto on instead of giving us the option but, I noticed my data was going fast and I was careful. This kid had motivations and ignored them he didn’t check his data usage at all? I was very glad that 9-5 Mac broke the story so I could quickly turn the setting off. If they hadn’t I would still be scratching my head and being careful now.
I still stand by what I say. If you don’t learn how to use your devices properly, it’s your fault. Period.
Man, that’s a lot of porn!
He’s lucky he’s not with my Telco, it would have cost him $14,000 extra!
Keep defending people, keep defending and blame the humans
WiFi Assist explicitly shows a cellular data icon when it is in use and doesn’t work for most streaming audio or video.
A lot of people here are scorning the kid for irresponsibility. However, doesn’t ANYONE think it’s ridiculous for the carrier to charge 2K for one month of data usage? Yes, the carriers are free to charge however they want, but it’s not like any physical goods were consumed. I think they should be targeting the telco – it doesn’t make sense that they have unlimited options, but tiered options can push you past the cost of the unlimited plans several times over.
Apparently it’s more fun to laugh at the stupidity of the user, rather than question why it’s reasonable to charge someone $2000 to download movies. It’s a bit like the extortionate fees which the telcos used to charge people if they roamed onto another network, or for long distance collect calls from another telco, and so on. It’s completely extortionate. Someone will say “there is a cost associated with using the network”, but that cost is nowhere even close to $2000. Sure, they can charge what they want I guess, but if you filled up your car at the gas station without reading the sign, and then the guy came out and charged you $2000, would you just call yourself an idiot for not reading the sign? I mean, it was right there, posted on the sign – you must be dumb, not to pay attention to the warning, right?
Until you are running you own wireless network, you can’t really say if it’s “fair” to charge someone $2000 to download movies. That’s the cost of the data usage on the network, he got text messages warning him about that and chose to ignore them. He can take responsibility for his own actions to disregard the warning and pay the data fees. And if he is not the account owner, then the account owner can take responsibility for the users under his account.
And your analogy of the gas station is totally invalid. If I was pumping gas and got a warning stating that I exceeded the $50 I wanted, yet chose to ignore it and keep pumping, then I’d be responsible for the overage. You’re acting like nobody knows the cost of anything and just starts using anything they’d like. And let’s say it’s my credit card paying for the gas and I tell my son to start pumping gas. If he pumps $200 into the car even after the $50 warning, then that’s on ME…NOT the gas station.
Wake up, dude. Your argument is invalid.
Also, yes…it IS more fun to laugh at the stupidity of the user here. He’s an idiot for ignoring the text. He made his bed…it’s time to lie in it.
I think a lot of people are missing the point on here and Apple have been a bit arrogant. It’s not for Apple to decide how much or little of your mobile data they should use and they should have made this function off by default. At the very least they should have made everyone aware that your data could be used even when you believe you’re using WIFI. Don’t get me wrong it’s a very useful function especially if you’re on 4G and have a unlimited data, but not everyone does.
Why is it that the son is the only one getting the alerts? Why is the kid the primary line on the account? That’s the main issue right there.
I know. I’m with Verizon and when another user on my account hits their data cap warnings, not only are THEY notified, but I’m also notified. Not sure which carrier this guy is with but it’s kind of ridiculous to blame WiFi Assist overall here. He got a warning text message about his data usage and ignored it. Even if WiFi Assist was partly to blame, he just kept on using it. And when you get tagged for additional data buckets over your limit, you get text messages for those too. He probably just ignored all of them. It would be great if the carrier could pull records of all of those texts to stick it to this kid. HA!
It’s just like when parents suddenly cry about their children running up in-app purchases. Why tie your credit card to your phone if your child is going to use it. Why not sort out the options for your child’s device it’s not difficult