Earlier this year, Sprint sued AT&T over its “blatantly misleading” 5G E network. Now, the two carriers have settled the lawsuit, but AT&T will continue advertising and displaying its controversial 5G E branding.
The merger between Sprint and T-Mobile is unlikely to be approved by anti-trust regulators, at least in its current form. The Wall Street Journal reports that Justice Department officials have informed T-Mobile and Sprint of the merger’s fate.
Four days after AT&T started slapping its ‘5G E’ icon on iPhones and iPads running the latest iOS beta last month, Sprint filed a lawsuit to bar AT&T from being able to use the marketing tactic for what is really advanced 4G LTE service that’s been around for years. Now, Sprint has taken the battle to the next level by taking out a full-page ad in The New York Times blasting its competitor for what it calls a “false and deceptive marketing campaign.”
T-Mobile’s CEO, John Legere, wrote a detailed blog post today about creating a “true alternative to fixed broadband.” As part of the pending Sprint/T-Mobile merger, the New T-Mobile plans to offer 5G Home Internet with lower prices and faster speeds than cable. It’s also going to start testing an LTE Home Internet service soon.
Sprint 5G service will, says the company, launch in May. But as with every other carrier to announce 5G plans so far, there’s an asterisk against that claim.
Verizon kicked off the fun back in October of last year, when it claimed to have launched a ‘5G Home’ service. This did offer an improvement in speeds over existing LTE service, but wasn’t actually 5G – and the company last month abandoned the rollout …
Updated with AT&T statement, below.
Sprint is suing AT&T over the latter’s decision to push a fake 5G label to both Android and iPhone smartphones when the coverage it actually offers is a version of 4G.
AT&T first started using the controversial 5G E label at the end of December, possibly in an attempt to be seen to make good on a promise it made at the beginning of last year …
A new report from Motherboard today takes a look into the practices of US wireless carriers selling user location data to third-parties. While it’s often credit card and other financial companies buying the location data for fraud detection and more, Motherboard says some rogue third-parties have access to user location data and it’s landing the hands of bounty hunters and the black market.
As part of the ongoing review process of T-Mobile’s proposed merger with Sprint, a pair of U.S. House panels will hold a joint hearing next month. The hearing will focus on addressing how the merger will affect consumers, with CEOs of both T-Mobile and Sprint set to testify.
Some users are reporting a bug in which cellular data connection is either permanently disabled or extremely spotty following the initial installation and reboot of iOS 12.1.3.
A new US wireless carrier customer study has been released today and T-Mobile has continued its streak of winning top honors over Verizon, AT&T, and Sprint with solid year-over-year customer satisfaction growth. More notably however, is that T-Mobile has beat out Verizon in the survey’s “quality brand” ranking.
Apple Business Chat was first introduced in 2018 and allows users to directly communicate with businesses via iMessage. The beta service has expanded with several new features and today, Sprint users can connect directly with an agent straight from their iOS device.
Update: AT&T now says it will also stop selling user location to aggregation services, according to CNET.
After Motherboard published details about a concerning investigation into how US wireless carriers are selling user location data to third-parties, T-Mobile and Sprint have made some fresh promises. They say they will end the practice of selling users’ data to third-party aggregators that often have little to no oversight.
After a long-running whistleblower lawsuit that alleged Sprint had been committing tax fraud since 2005, the 4th most popular US carrier has agreed to settle the case with a $330 million fine.
[Update: CWA has released notes on its presentation that it gave to the FCC last week outlining why it thinks the T-Mobile Sprint merger should be blocked. Arguments include the potential competitive impact, employment impact, rural coverage claims, 5G claims, and more.]
T-Mobile and Sprint’s proposed merger has seen pushback from various groups. One in particular, the Communications Workers of America (CWA), is concerned the deal could mean up to 30,000 lost jobs. Now, 14 organizations including Consumer Reports, CWA, and the American Antitrust Institute have shared with the House of Representatives why they believe the deal shouldn’t be allowed and also called for hearings on the merger proposal.
Back in September, the FCC paused the clock on the 180-day review period for T-Mobile and Sprint’s merger plans and asked for more documentation. Now, after the carriers filed the requested details, the FCC is asking the public to weigh in on the matter.
T-Mobile has today shared that it has received approval from its majority shareholder, Deutsche Telekom, to move forward with the existing merger agreement with Sprint.
CIRP has shared a new analyst note today covering Q3 results for the major US wireless carriers. T-Mobile was the clear leader with the highest customer retention rate as well as seeing the greatest customer growth.
T-Mobile’s CEO John Legere along with President and COO Mike Sievert are set to hold a town hall meeting to discuss the merger with Sprint employees tomorrow. But ahead of the meeting, the CWA union will be holding a rally near Sprint’s headquarters aimed at preventing job losses.
In an interesting development, Sprint has shared an image of how its LTE coverage compares to that of AT&T, Verizon, and T-Mobile. While it might seem strange at first, there is a strategy behind Sprint’s move in detailing just how far behind its competitors it is.
T-Mobile and Sprint officially filed their merger plans with the FCC back in June. While the FCC typically makes a determination within six months, the commission informed the two carriers today that it is pressing pause on the “180-day transaction shot clock.”
Following security vulnerabilities affecting AT&T and T-Mobile a few days ago, TechCrunch reports this weekend that Sprint is also facing a security loophole. According to the report, Sprint used “two sets of easy-to-guess usernames and passwords” for access to a company portal that housed customer data…
J.D. Power is out today with its latest survey on satisfaction of customer care for wireless carriers. T-Mobile handily took top honors, but ironically, Sprint came in last place as the two are in the middle of a merger deal.
Last week news spread that T-Mobile and Sprint could officially file for their planned merger as early as this week. Today, the companies have delivered a public information statement to the FCC that shares why they think the deal will be good for consumers, innovation, and more.
