
AT&T to pay $60M over U.S. allegations it lied in 'unlimited data' pledge - ishikawa
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-at-t-settlement/att-will-pay-60-million-over-u-s-allegations-it-lied-in-unlimited-data-pledge-government-idUSKBN1XF26Q
======
Trias11
Pocket change. Cost of doing business.

They made way more money by misleading customers and will continue to do so
with penalties that small.

~~~
Animats
Yes. AT&T now offers "AT&T Unlimited Starter", "AT&T Unlimited Extra", and
"AT&T Unlimited & More Premium".

 _" Available when Stream Saver is turned off. Learn more at
att.com/streamsaver. After 15 GB hotspot speed limited to maximum of 128Kbps.
Customers may temporarily experience slower speeds during busy times. On AT&T
Unlimited & More Premium, if you exceed 22 GB of data on a line in one billing
cycle, your speed may be slowed until the end of that billing cycle when the
network is congested. All AT&T Unlimited Starter and AT&T Unlimited Extra
customers have a limit of 1.5 Mbps (SD quality) when video streaming, and may
experience temporarily reduced speeds when the network is congested."_

The FTC didn't even make them stop using the term "Unlimited".

~~~
shpx
128Kbps for 1 month is 42GB
[https://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=128Kbps+for+1+month](https://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=128Kbps+for+1+month)

~~~
bashy
Do they mean kilobits or kilobytes?

~~~
user5994461
This has to be bytes, you wouldn't be able to open a website in entire minutes
if it were bits.

~~~
opencl
Oh they do mean bits, it is indeed completely unusable after you hit the limit
and get throttled.

------
epmaybe
I'm surprised that the FTC didn't push harder for an admission or some
statement by AT&T to make this look like a win for the gov't. AT&T's
statement:

> “None of these allegations were ever proved in court. We were fully prepared
> to defend ourselves, but decided settling was in the best interests of
> consumers,” said Jim Greer, a spokesman for AT&T.

~~~
r00fus
Are you really surprised with this administration? I'd guess if I were a
business with a pending investigation/lawsuit, I'd push really hard to "do
business" with this environment, as opposed to what may come in 2021.

~~~
Domenic_S
Some people will make anything an opportunity to say "orange man bad". Here's
some other history:

* (2014) Verizon settles an overbilling case for $64MM, of which only $36MM went to payouts. [0]

* (2015) Verizon settles a robocalling class action for only $4MM. [1]

* (2009) Sprint settles an ETF class action for only $17.5MM [2]

* (2015) Sprint pays only $131MM to settle a lawsuit about their bungled $36 BILLION merger with Nextel [3]

This has far less to do with "this administration" and far more to do with how
business is run in America. I'm not saying it's right, not at all, but I do
want to point out that buying into this partisan nonsense distracts us
(voters) from actually changing the system meaningfully (where "meaningful" is
creating an environment where this doesn't happen).

[0] [https://topclassactions.com/lawsuit-settlements/closed-
settl...](https://topclassactions.com/lawsuit-settlements/closed-
settlements/47886-verizon-wireless-family-shareplan-class-action-settlement/)

[1] And more... [https://moneyinc.com/10-verizon-lawsuits-you-should-know-
abo...](https://moneyinc.com/10-verizon-lawsuits-you-should-know-about/)

[2] [https://www.fiercewireless.com/wireless/sprint-settling-
clas...](https://www.fiercewireless.com/wireless/sprint-settling-class-action-
etf-lawsuit-for-17-5m)

[3] [https://www.fiercewireless.com/wireless/sprint-
pays-131m-to-...](https://www.fiercewireless.com/wireless/sprint-pays-131m-to-
settle-class-action-lawsuit-over-nextel-merger-claims)

------
debt
If you wanna have a good laugh:

Go to an AT&T store and purchase a plan with a phone using installments. Then,
wait a day, and try to return it at a different AT&T store.

You will go through the absolutely worst customer experience imaginable; so
bad, in fact, it'll make you laugh out loud. Their printers won't work,
they'll be too slow, the systems will go down, the batteries will die in their
payment devices. At least that's what I experienced on every one of the three
times they asked me to come back to the store to return the phone(because each
time their systems simply were unable to do it).

So it's no surprise to me that they got caught lying to their customers.

------
wiseleo
There needs to be a minimum acceptable speed threshold. “2G" is meaningless.
They do not downgrade the protocol to 2G, hence that term only serves to
confuse customers. 2G refers to EDGE that was available at 144kbps, which is
faster than a bonded ISDN, which is fast enough to stream a 128kbit mp3.

I would actually be happy with true unlimited 144kbps. It’s usable. I can run
RDP over that with reasonable refresh rate.

It is also not possible as a customer to voluntarily turn off high speed when
you don’t need it.

From experience, once my connection gets limited to 2G, my speed is closer to
9600bps, which is absolutely unusable for interactive Internet use.

I have two phones. One has Visible from Verizon with allegedly unlimited but
relatively slow data at 2-10mbit with unlimited tethering. The second is my
T-mobile phone with an allegedly unlimited but in reality limited to 50GB much
faster data with a 7GB hotspot.

I use my Tmobile data when I have to and the rest of the time that phone is
tethered to my Visible phone. Visible is $40/mo, T-mobile is $80 and I may
downgrade it to a limited plan with zero-rated video.

------
acd
Why can big corps pay and get free? Its often happens, company x made crime y,
pays government z and gets free.

~~~
bryanrasmussen
It is a great quality of the Law that it allows both rich and poor alike to
pay a lot of money to avoid jail time when caught committing a crime.

~~~
ngold
Everyone has the freedom to pay.

~~~
bryanrasmussen
Everyone can pay their freedom, but inexplicably only certain people do.

------
jessaustin
Interesting that "allegations" is in the link and the HN title, but not in the
title at the link. I guess if they're paying $60M then something must have
happened....

------
wiseleo
Better source: [https://www.ftc.gov/news-events/press-
releases/2019/11/att-p...](https://www.ftc.gov/news-events/press-
releases/2019/11/att-pay-60-million-resolve-ftc-allegations-it-misled-
consumers) direct from FTC links to the court documents regulating disclosure
requirements.

------
Johnny555
$60M? So basically no punishment to deter them or competitors from doing it
again? What is that, like less than 50 cents/customer?

------
subsaharancoder
I'm always weary of any telco pushing an "unlimited data" product, the terms
and conditions attached to the product definitely makes one think twice and
basically end up being "Unlimited data but [a lot of terms and conditions
hidden at the very bottom that they know most people won't read and by the
time they do it is too late]

------
HashThis
Please go after T-Mobile next. They throttle their "unlimited" to unusable.

------
dorkwood
Just out of curiosity, where does the money from a fine like this go?

~~~
JohnFen
Generally speaking, the money goes into the federal treasury where tax revenue
and the like goes.

------
rubyfan
If you are one of these customers (I am) this seems a little unfair. We
overpaid way more than we’ll ever see back. What kind of refund does this
translate to $6?

~~~
cannonedhamster
It translates to nothing for the party who was damaged. Literally they will
get nothing. And if they don't like that deal the government can make it hurt
more. Your life here ruined over an ounce of weed, but rob multiple people
access you get a bonus and the company gets a small tax that mostly goes to
lawyers.

------
bdcravens
They have about 150M customers, so about $0.38 each.

~~~
dbancajas
So new "other charges" line on my bill?

~~~
grawprog
They should just come out and be honest and call it the 'middle finger fee'.

------
pcurve
None of these allegations were ever proved in court. We were fully prepared to
defend ourselves, but decided settling was in the best interests of
consumers,” said Jim Greer, a spokesman for AT&T.

Stay classy Jim.

~~~
rolltiide
And shareholders

The international ones are the most concerned about a company’s domestic
relationship with its government because the power imbalance is hard to
comprehend and trust

------
RedRose
They didn’t lie. They did give the users unlimited data, but just slowed down
the loading of apps and web browsers. That is completely understandable
because where are they going to store all of this data.

~~~
t0mbstone
"unlimited" means that there are no limits. Period.

Unlimited means no limits to speed, and no limits to quantity. If there is any
type of artificial limit, then the thing ceases to be "unlimited". That is
just straight up common sense, based on dictionary definitions.

~~~
tpmoney
I’ve long thought this is an issue of changing definitions. To anyone who was
buying cell phone data plans when it was charged by the byte (and later in
tiers of bytes with insane overage charges), “unlimited data” was easily
understood to mean no overage charges, no per byte fees.

But somewhere along the way (or perhaps as an unfortunate consequence of not
seeing far enough ahead to always throttle unlimited plans) the definition in
consumer minds also seemed to include no speed limits either.

~~~
wyre
Cell phone plans are purchased with the speed of service. Unlimited data at 50
mbps, for example, stops being unlimited when the speed is no longer 50 mbps.

~~~
scarface74
Cell phones are never sold with a speed of service. How could they be? Your
speed is determined by congestion, the proximity of the tower, etc.

~~~
kstrauser
Those are natural limits, though. If I go to an all-you-can-eat buffet but
just had my wisdom teeth removed, it's not their fault that I'll cry in a
corner while delicately nibbling a small bowl of pudding. They were willing to
let me eat more, even if I wasn't capable of it.

If the same buffet made you wait 2 hours between plates, then it's no longer
realistically an all-you-can-eat buffet.

~~~
scarface74
Taking the analogy to an extreme, if you went to an all you can eat buffet, it
would only be open 24 hours a day and there is only so many times you could go
through the line and the kitchen can only cook so much food.

If the restaurant is crowded, you’re going to have to both wait longer to get
through the line and the kitchen won’t be able to cook enough to satisfy all
of the customers.

There is also a known limit of how much data can be transmitted over a certain
frequency and only certain frequencies are amenable to data.

For instance, T-mobile was infamous for not working well in buildings because
the spectrum they were using couldn’t travel through buildings.

