Tech Info

Ok. So let me clear up a few things before I get into any more details so everyone can know what's going on.

If you don't know by now, I'm rockin an iPhone 4. Yes, it's the best phone in the market, hands down. This post is not a debate of that topic. The problem came about a few weeks ago, when I got an email from AT&T saying:

"Did you know tethering your Smartphone to a computer requires a tethering plan? Pls call 866-679-7118 for details or visit att.com/dataplans"

Ok, so tethering is basically giving internet to your laptop, iPod, XBox, PS3 or any other device that can use the internet wirelessly. Thing is, AT&T provides this service for a fee, per phone, and it's limited to 4gig monthly. Being a web developer, I can really benefit from tethering but I could do without the extra bill. Other catch is, being a long time iPhone customer with AT&T, I have been grandfathered into an unlimited data plan for $30 monthly. Thats $30 a month for unlimited data (not available on new plans), compared to $25 monthly for 2 gigs and $15 for 200 mb and if you go over the data limit, they charge you $10 for an extra gig of data.

To me, it seems like those plans are not very friendly and don't give you alot of options. So I will stick with my unlimited plan. And also, it's very unsettling to me how they are able to know that you are tethering your device anyways. Some people say it's cause you use too much data.... well if I have an unlimited data plan, what is too much data? So if I accept that, then I can still argue, all the data is coming from the phone. How do they know otherwise? Well, they can possibly tell the browser you're using as well. Browsers sent their info when sending packets over the network. But still, I can fake the user agent of any browser and that is not a good enough reason.

The one way that I can think of, that they can legally see what I'm doing on my machine and that it is actually tethering, is that the MAC address of the other devices are passed with the packets and with this I think they can determine that other devices were used, tethered through the phone. This is the "fix" that I am suggesting with the instructions below. Beyond the MAC addresses, I would say they have to literally invade my privacy and

Now, by making some changes to your iPhone, you can "jailbreak" it. What this does is allow you to make changes to the phone's system that are not initially allowed by either AT&T or Apple. Maybe you like people to control your belongings even after you paid money to buy it from them, but I don't. I love technology and being able to "play around" with the things in the background of the system are very beneficial. It's the same with others though. Example is Microsoft's XBox... You can't even use the bluetooth devices you may have already paid alot of money for with the system due to the restrictions. However, I think you can "mod your XBox" to get this setup.

Anyways, for the real reason you're here... you want to find a way to get around AT&T punishing you for using your own, paid for internet data. Well below, I show you how by using MyWi and PocketProxy.

Steps

1. Get PocketProxy from the App Store now before they read this post and realize what good it will be used for (they did it with the netshare app - Google it)

2. Jailbreak you phone (if not already) and purchase and install MyWi

3. Once the first two steps are complete, start up MyWi and turn on wireless tethering.

4. Minimize this app (it should run in the background)

5. Open the PocketProxy app and start it

6. On the macnine you want to access the internet on, go to the browser and enter the proxy settings. If possible, change the proxy for the entire machine

PS. If you want to have PocketProxy run in the background, get the Backgrounder app and set it to run as if in the foreground. Then you can minimize the app once it's started and still browse at the same time.

PPS. Of course this can't exactly be verified by an AT&T employee but this should send all packets that are tethered through the proxy, thus any data on the other end should be hidden and only be passed using the iPhone's MAC address.

Thats it.

There's a war on unlimited data being fought as we speak, and Ma Bell  is leading the main charge. Just days after AT&T announced it would  begin throttling data speeds for the heaviest bandwidth hogs  grandfathered into the carrier's no-limit internet service, it's also  confirmed it's ready to crack the whip on illegal tethering as well. In  attempt to achieve "fairness for all of [its] customers," the carrier has  added a bit of force behind its March announcement, sending out    notices to anyone using their jailbroken iPhones as a mobile hotspot.  The gist? Cut it out or be scaled back to a tiered data plan. In a  statement originally given to 9to5mac, an AT&T spokesperson said:

Earlier this year, we began sending letters, emails, and text  messages to a small number of smartphone customers who use  their devices for tethering but aren't on our required tethering  plan. Our goal here is fairness for all of our customers. (This  impacts a only small percentage of our smartphone customer  base.)

The letters outline three choices:

1. Stop tethering and keep their current plan (including  grandfathered unlimited plan)
2. Proactively call AT&T or visit our stores and move to the required tethering plan 3. Do nothing and we'll go ahead and add the tethering plan on their behalf - after the dated noted in  their customer notification

AT&T  confirmed that this statement is indeed  true. Consider this the company's last warning -- your time to enjoy all-you-can-eat tethering is almost at an end. How soon the day of reckoning will come, however, likely depends on when you received the notification originally. And you thought you were being so sneaky...

If you’ve gotten AT&T’s “text of death” relating to your tethering usage, you’re probably utilizing free tethering through jailbreak apps like MyWi. Understandably, AT&T doesn’t want its users to have a free broadband connection through tethering hacks, and the carrier has started moving users over to its DataPro plan for $45 a month.

So, how is AT&T targeting unauthorized tethering on its network?

“Jailbroken iPhones typically use the same tethering technique as a standard iPhone, the one that’s already present in iOS. This method exposes tethering activity quite readily, because the iPhone, when in tethering mode, sends traffic through an alternate APN (AT&T access point/router) for the express purpose of identifying the traffic as tethered data. This makes it extremely easy for AT&T to identify whether or not an iOS device is utilizing tethering, and just how much of their data is consumed via tethering.

Some tethering applications for iOS make use of alternative methods and route tethered traffic through the phone’s normal data APN, but by and large, most jailbreakers stick with the stock application because it’s easy to use and doesn’t require any complicated setup. In fact, many iPhone users jailbreak for the sole purpose of avoiding AT&T’s tethering fees (for why, see next section). These are the people AT&T’s is going after.”

Because MyWi, the most popular tethering alternative for jailbreakers, uses the same APN as the standard tethering system for iOS, AT&T can see a jailbroken iPhone’s tethering activity very easily. AT&T has been contacting its list of unauthorized tethering users in waves, and there are no signs that the warnings from AT&T will stop anytime soon.

The people getting targeted by AT&T are obviously those with a grandfathered unlimited data plan. If you’re fortunate enough to still have an unlimited data for your iPhone, you can tether till your heart’s content through methods like MyWi and never have to worry about going over on your bill. AT&T doesn’t like that jailbreakers are able circumvent their $45 system for tethering.

There are other options for tethering in Cydia. PdaNet is an alternative to MyWi that has anew option to “hide” your tethering usage, assumedly redirecting you to the regular APN that the iPhone uses for data. If PdaNet does indeed mask your data from being sent through AT&T’s tethering APN, then AT&T should have no way of distinguishing unauthorized tethering data from regular data.

TetherMe is another popular tethering solution for jailbreakers that hasn’t gotten much attention in this whole AT&T debacle. From what we’re hearing, TetherMe users are reporting that they haven’t gotten contacted from AT&T about any sort of unauthorized tethering. However, this doesn’t mean that TetherMe users will not be contacted by AT&T soon.

As of right now, it seems that the updated version of PdaNet is your best bet for safe, free tethering on a jailbroken iPhone. Although AT&T does mainly use APNs to distinguish different types of data, your carrier could also be able to sniff data packets to see different types of traffic.

A bsdiff patch to apply to CommCenter in 3.1.2 to re-enable tethering is available here for the 3GS and here for the 3G. It's just a 2-byte patch as shown below (and an appropriate readjusting of the mach-o's codesign hash):

USE THIS AT YOUR OWN RISK! Your carrier may end up charging you for unauthorized tethering access.

Update #1 It looks like a lot of people have been looking at CommCenter lately because IRC user CleanAir had a similar tethering patch. Meanwhile over in the 2G CommCenter, WhiteRat and geniusan have patched in native MMS support for that platform. Kudos to CleanAir, WhiteRat, and geniusan for digging into CommCenter and coming up with patches!

Update #2 A few tutorials have started to pop up. Eventually this will be made a part of the normal PwnageTool flow but for now this is best left for the adventurous users out there!

You can download modified carrier bundles right here. To install this, Follow the steps in my MMS & Tethering iPhone 3.0 3g & 3gS Instructions

Tethering menu is located
Settings >Genreal >Network >Internet Tethering

From here you can turn ON or OFF Tethering

First, let's enable IPCC updates on iTunes 8.2.

Mac OS X:
Close iTunes if it is open
Start Terminal (Applications > Utilities)
Run the following command: defaults write com.apple.iTunes carrier-testing -bool TRUE

Windows 2000/XP/Vista (32-bit):
Go to Start -> Run (
type in "command" and hit enter
Type/copy+paste this into the command console that comes up: "C:\Program Files\iTunes\iTunes.exe" /setPrefInt carrier-testing 1
Hit enter

Windows XP/Vista (64-bit):
Go to Start -> Run (
type in "command" and hit enter
Type/copy+paste this into the command console that comes up: "C:\Program Files (x86)\iTunes\iTunes.exe" /setPrefInt carrier-testing 1
Hit enter

There, now you can update IPCC files as you were able to in 8.1. Now, let's go get us some Carrier Bundle goodness. You can download the modified bundle right here. To install this, follow these steps.

1 Download the file to some location on your computer
2 Plug in your iPhone
3 Start iTunes
4 Click on your iPhone in the device listing in iTunes
5 Alt-Click the "Update" button (Shift-click in Windows)
6 Browse to where you saved the IPCC you downloaded
7 Select this file and click Choose
8 Wait...
9 ???
10 PROFIT!!! er, Success!
11 Reboot Phone

You now have the modified carrier bundle. With this, you can do tethering! But wait, we wanted MMS too! Well, this will unfortunately require you to have some other form of GSM (or better, AT&T) phone. I used a cheap prepaid phone from AT&T's GoPhone system (a Motorola BT60). I'm sure you can borrow one from a friend.

NOTE: AT&T Family Plan users who have a family messaging plan can skip steps 7-11

UPDATE: Seems AT&T may be blocking these steps from immediately taking effect. My best advice is to call AT&T after step 10/11 and before step 12 and tell them your MMS isn't working. They should fix it.

1 Remove the sim cards from both the iPhone and your non-Apple phone
2 Place the iPhone sim card into the non-Apple phone
3 Power on the new phone
4 Make a phone call or two (your voicemail works)
5 Log in to your myWireless account at wireless.att.com
6 It should now say that your device is whatever you put your SIM into. If it doesn't, repeat step 4 a few times.
7 Go to the "Features" tab
8 Select a "Messaging Plan", one that isn't an iPhone plan.
9 Click next and go through all the legal crap
10 You should now have MMS enabled on your account... so...
11 DO NOT ADD AN IPHONE TEXTING PLAN BACK TO YOUR ACCOUNT! EVER! IT WILL DISABLE MMS AGAIN!
12 Swap the iPhone sim card back into the iPhone
13 Reboot the iPhone

You should now have MMS and Tethering working! Tethering is easy on the Mac, simply go into Settings -> General -> Network on the iPhone and turn Tethering on, then plug your phone into your Mac via the normal iPhone cable. Your Mac will see your iPhone as a USB networking device and auto-tether you. There's also an easy step-by-step process to get Bluetooth tethering working, but in my experience it is much slower than over USB.

That's pretty much it, folks. Have fun!