Microsoft Explains Windows Phone 7 'Phantom Data' 270
Fuzzy Eric writes "Microsoft has confirmed that some handsets running its Windows Phone 7 software are sending and receiving 'phantom data.' The problem surfaced in early January with some owners of phones running Windows Phone 7, claiming that their phone was sending 'between 30 and 50MB of data' every day; an amount that would eat into a 1GB allowance in 20 days. Microsoft said its investigation found that most problems were caused by a unnamed 'third party' service. It said that the problem seemed to only affect 'a small (low single-digit) percentage of Windows Phone customers.'"
NSA (Score:5, Funny)
Re:NSA (Score:5, Funny)
No wonder that this third-party service remains unnamed. After all NSA stands for 'no such agency'.
Ahem: "No Such Application"
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Somebody's gotta pay for that data, and if the government wont... [arstechnica.com]
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The FBI would just outsource to its wiretap/phone billing software contractors.
Was it like George Koronias of Vodaphone in Greece or Adamo Bove, head of security at Telecom Italia?
Or did MS just 'google' and test to see if 3rd party marketing could get away with a nice daily ad database update?
A security hardware/software backdoor, marketing or just MS been MS and alpha testing on your mobile plan?
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Unless there is serious profit in destroying lives, but so far that isn't the case
That depends. There is profit to be had from hyping up a piece of shit software, let's call it Windies MEVisto, have everyone buy it and complain that it's destroying their lives. Because then you can bringing out a new and similar version later called Windies XP7SE "Doesn't Destroy Your Life So Much" Edition to get people to pay yet again.
MS Fault Playbook: Two Answers (Score:5, Insightful)
1. No Answer
or
2. We found the problem. It wasn't our fault, and it doesn't matter because it's not happening to anyone. (lie)
Re:MS Fault Playbook: Two Answers (Score:5, Interesting)
We found the problem. It wasn't our fault, and it doesn't matter because it's not happening to anyone. (lie)
Until Microsoft say which service causes this (so it can be independently verified by users) then you just have to assume that it is a lie. Normally I like to give the benefit of the doubt (and it does seem feasible that a 3rd party app is responsible, but like you said, this follows the standard style of PR spin that most companies employ.
This would not be a problem if the mobile OS actually valued the customer over the developers and phone companies. My last Symbian phone prompted the user to give permission to any app that wanted to access the Internet. No spyware under the guise of a game here, no 3rd party services chewing up quota, no apps being just thin layers over websites.
I hate seeing that circle animation that says data access is happening on my iPhone for something that shouldn't need it. Even worse, I hate the fact that on the iPhone the developer can turn off that display so you don't know if any connection has occured. Evil. I presume that the Windows Phone does the same thing.
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I hate seeing that circle animation
Clearly you're looking at it wrong. Try flipping the phone over, that should fix the problem of seeing the circle animation.
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"Most people" may also be an overstatement.
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Probably because, while they're far from perfect, more of Apple's mistakes have been both relatively harmless and also overblown by the media ( they mysterious "death grip" is a good example). Alternatively, many of Microsoft's mistakes have been glossed over my the media and have actually been quite annoying.
In this case, there seems to be no good reason why Microsoft couldn't have revealed exactly what was going on. If its a telco app, then just say "We can't reveal any more details due to our non-discl
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Funny, when stuff like this happens to Apple, why does everyone give them the benefit of the doubt, but when it is Microsoft it is "EVIL" instantly?
I think that it is funny that you would claim this in response to me calling Apple evil (or at least I labelled their practice of allowing everyone to screw with the user to be evil).
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It may be "just as bad" but will land you in the "most likely correct" category, rather than the "most likely wrong" category.
Re:MS Fault Playbook: Two Answers (Score:4, Funny)
1. No Answer
or
2. We found the problem. It wasn't our fault, and it doesn't matter because it's not happening to anyone. (lie)
I can believe it's not happening to anyone - has anyone got one??
This is Slashdot. If they do have one, they won't admit it out of shame.
Poster: "I'm a drug addled pervert."
Slashdot: "Whatever"
Poster: "I love Windows 7 and Microsoft products!"
Slashdot: "You sick fuck! How could you be so STUPID! Get the fuck outta here you godforsaken creep!"
"a small (low single-digit) percentage" (Score:5, Funny)
That can't be true. There are more than two reports.
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1.5 million as of end of December [mashable.com] so somewhere between 0 and 60,000 affected users (assuming "Low single digit" maxes out at 4%).
Re:"a small (low single-digit) percentage" (Score:4, Insightful)
Actually that number comes with a big caveat since it started circulating a few weeks earlier, that even that mashable article, or the MS link it references, are carefully avoiding to shed light on. Those reported are 1.5 million handset sold "to carriers", or "by manufacturers" (which mostly sell to carriers, gosh).
For all we know, 90% of those 1.5 million might be still be unsold, sitting on shelves and warehouses and NOT in the hands of a customer. And that kind of carefully treading around the ambiguity is a giant, glowing, blinking warning sign..
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That 1.5 million number represents sales of phones by manufacturers to retailers [pcworld.com], not sales of retailers to customers.
Re:"a small (low single-digit) percentage" (Score:5, Interesting)
This is how typically MS depicts success when it isn't. 1.5 million Windows phones have been sold to retailers and carriers, not to consumers. Considering that Dell, Garmin-Asus, HTC, HP , LG, Samsung, Sony Ericsson, Toshiba and Qualcomm all made phones and they were launched on the networks: AT&T, Deutsche Telekom, Orange, SFR, Sprint, Telecom Italia, Telefónica, Telstra, T-Mobile USA, Verizon Wireless, Vodafone, Telus, Bell Canada and SingTel, 1.5 million is abysmal. That's on average 100,000 per carrier and 160,000 per manufacturer. Remember that number also represents units that were given to MS employees. If I understand the process, MS employees could buy a phone and the company would reimburse them.
In this history of MS, they launched the Zune the same way. They showed great sales figures for the 2006 holiday season but what they didn't make clear was those were units shipped to retailers not sold to consumers. They also didn't disclose that for several months after that they shipped virtually no Zunes because the retailers were fully stocked. In the end, retailers had to get rid of the Zunes mostly at huge discounts.
Compensation? Class action? (Score:2)
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Explains? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Explains? (Score:5, Insightful)
3rd Party? (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:3rd Party? (Score:5, Insightful)
If it turns out that a network is bundling crapware with the handset that uses too much data in some conditions, or a vendor such as HTC has a bug in their app, then I wouldn't blame MS for it.
It's a big "if", but it's a definite possibility and until we know the reason I suggest we stop getting so hysterical about it.
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If the telecom operator provides a branded phone with apps that can't be removed and one of those apps is eating your data traffic then you should get that data traffic for free.
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If the telecom operator provides a branded phone with apps that can't be removed and one of those apps is eating your data traffic then you should get that data traffic for free.
Sure you "should". But will you, without some kind of lawsuit? Probably not.
The new US customer service model: the customer is always wrong, and largely irrelevant.
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It gets better (Score:5, Interesting)
Apparently* it's an external problem and there will be "no need for a system software update." [oneindia.in].
Makes you wonder about who can do what with your Windows Phone 7...
*As I noted in my submission. Which was earlier. WTF editors!?
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WP7 (and others) needs a utility (Score:3)
Yahoo! (Score:2)
According to ars, Yahoo mail [arstechnica.com] might be the one to blame.
"All very peculiar. The main culprit fingered by the Windows Phone 7 community over this issue (though not named in the statement) is Yahoo! Mail."
They're not just pointing fingers (Score:4, Interesting)
I'm glad y'all RTFA and saw where it said
"We are in contact with the third party to assist them in making the necessary fixes," a spokesperson said. The firm also said that it was looking into "potential workarounds" until the issue was solved.
fwiw, there's evidence that one potential culprit was a yahoo mail client
That's an "explanation"? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:That's an "explanation"? (Score:4, Insightful)
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Gee, how helpful... (Score:2)
So Microsoft won't tell their users who have problems WHICH software is offending here? Seriously? I'm sure their affected WP7 users just love being denied that information while paying AT&T the bills for their nightly "activities" due to a "third party service". At least they'd be able to turn it off while waiting for a fix if they knew which software caused the problems.
Developers/Partners before Users (Score:4, Insightful)
Who does Microsoft care more about? Users or Developers and Partners? Their actions speak louder than words. They are reluctant to tell people the truth so that they can protect themselves or conserve their resources in favor of protecting developers and partners. In the world of Microsoft (and indeed Apple and most other commercial software vendors) the users are to be taken for granted and abuse of users, their information, their computers and their resources are all the norm.
I realize this is more preaching to the choir for most people here and/or this is "stating the obvious" but I think it's sometimes useful to remind people and users of where the priorities and motivations of the vendors they use and rely on are. By knowing their priorities and motivations, you can keep yourself appropriately aware and even guarded. For example, we have a LOT og Google fans here. In the eyes of some, Google does no evil and can do no wrong. They are an advertiser and a marketer and maintain all of the priorities and motivations of advertisers and marketers. It is important to keep Google in perspective. Google is just one example. Microsoft's main strategy is to keep their markets saturated with Microsoft products and services. This is accomplished through strategic partnerships and arrangements with OEMs and resellers among others. This means they place their priorities in favor of those channels; partners, OEMs, developers and all. If Microsoft's primary channel was retail and online sales, their priority would then be focused on the people who buy their products and services directly. But this is, for the most part, not the case.
For this reason ("Who does Microsoft care about?") I generally avoid Microsoft. It is not because they are buggy or insecure or "evil." It is the fact that as a user or customer, they are not interested in my needs or interests. That's a simple fact.
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That is a good question and I think the answer is in maintaining their position. They do only what is necessary and skip anything deemed unnecessary. This explains their reluctance to acknowledge and to fix even the most critical of security flaws. So why fix it at all? Because without it, all users would stop using it.
So there is a state of basic functionality that must be maintained, but that should not be confused with "caring about the user's interests" beyond their ability to continue using the pro
Re:Developers/Partners before Users (Score:4, Insightful)
Who does Microsoft care more about? Users or Developers and Partners?
They have no reason to care about users, since few users are actually customers. That copy of Windows on your Dell doesn't make you a Microsoft customer, it makes Dell their customer unless you bought Windows in a box and installed it yourself. Few enough people do that to make them completely unimportant to MS.
Unnamed? (Score:2)
My suggestion? British Petroleum. They are tracking out movements to determine the best place to have the next oil slick. If no ones around, no one will notice.
any other suggestions? Once we decide on a winner we can go update Wikipedia with our "Facts" and start spreading it around the internet via forums and blog posts. Remember
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> any other suggestions?
Surely Sarah Palin must be involved.
Eating away (Score:2)
...an amount that would eat into a 1GB allowance in 20 days
A strange expression - I would have thought even 1 byte would "eat into" any size allowance, technically speaking.
Carrier? (Score:4, Interesting)
So now, (Score:2)
Somebody without a stake in the answer needs to do the analysis.
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Damn... I would ask you to take a picture and send it to me for proof, but I don't want you to go over your limit.
Re:Who gets the 1GB plan? (Score:4, Funny)
Re:Who gets the 1GB plan? (Score:5, Funny)
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I have a friend who is on the lowest level plan that AT&T offers for the iPhone, and was able to afford one when the plans switched from unlimited only to a tiered system. She really doesn't need unlimited data, since the bulk of her data use is done via wifi with 3G/Edge for those handy times when she needs it. I say "can now afford" not in that "children going hungry" sense, but that her budget was reasonable for a new phone, but with her usage patterns the cost of an unlimited/huge plan would have be
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Not every customer needs an unlimited/giant plan.
That's very true, but the way the tiers work is really designed to screw the customer anyway. If they didn't want to do that, they'd bill you based on which tier your usage patterns fit into, rather than you adjusting your usage patterns to fit a specific tier.
I'm happily on AT&T's unlimited plan, and it works well for me: I've got some months where I pull 1 gig, and one where I've pulled as high as 6. Granted, it's mostly from video.
The real problem with the cost of a smartphone is that the baseli
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Damn... I would ask you to take a picture and send it to me for proof, but I don't want you to go over your limit.
Too late. Today's the 20th.
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Sorry, there just wasn't enough room in the margins.
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I'm on a 1Gb/month plan (Nexus One), but between Wi-Fi and not streaming video 24/7 I've only pulled 2.5Gb of Cell data in the last 9 months.
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Actually, in my experience cell phones are much cheaper in the 3rd world. For 30 bucks in most of Africa you can get a cell phone and more minutes than you could ever use. I'm not sure about smart-phones over there, but the basic cell phone service is astoundingly cheap.
We in the "1st" world are being cheated by carriers.
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Re:Who gets the 1GB plan? (Score:4, Funny)
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We're just used to that old and lame excuse that 'Everything is more expensive in Switzerland *shrug*'... But frankly, that 1 GB limit is plain stupid. Especially when you consider that these plans aren't even primarily targeted at mobile devices like phones but mobile devices like laptops and netbooks and there, one GB is just a lame joke.
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That would be the majority of users, because they're in wifi range 99% of the time, and actually only need 3G for the random snippits of data at random times.
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Note the fun "25c per MB" part when your (or your "smart" phone) is done with the 1 or 2 GB per month.
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I'm not saying the phantom data isn't bad, I think every kind of phantom is bad, but who on earth gets a smart-phone and signs up for the 1GB a month plan? Do they even have those?
Ok, based on responses to this I guess I'll make a different point: Apparently I'm the only one who uses tethering while traveling.
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When you're with AT&T you have the choice between 300MB and 1GB. A lot of providers won't allow you to eat up more than 2GB before hitting some type of FUP.
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Yes you are, as there are far more economically viable data contracts utilising 3G data dongles. If you have your laptop with you anyway, why are you using a phone for data? Don't give me "It's one less thing to carry"; If you are using a device which requires tethering for data, it almost certainly has a USB port.
Because I have a phone that does tethering with unlimited data already, and over the last month I drove all around Montana, Idaho, Wyoming, Utah, Nevada, and Arizona, and out in those big western states there is a lot of land where the only available internet is 3G(which, surprisingly, is almost everywhere out there).
The performance is fine for what I'm doing, I already have the contract, I already have the phone, its easy, and what more reason do you need?
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I'm not saying the phantom data isn't bad, I think every kind of phantom is bad, but who on earth gets a smart-phone and signs up for the 1GB a month plan? Do they even have those?
Ok, based on responses to this I guess I'll make a different point: Apparently I'm the only one who uses tethering while traveling.
Tethering would make quite a difference, I imagine. As someone who hasn't traveled since I got my smartphone, I have no experience with it.
Mainly, I use my phone with wi-fi whenever possible, and consequently my 100MB data add-on is more than enough for me.
Re:Who gets the 1GB plan? (Score:5, Funny)
I'm not saying the phantom data isn't bad, I think every kind of phantom is bad
The Ghost who Walks would be extremely unhappy to hear you say this.
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I'm not saying the phantom data isn't bad, I think every kind of phantom is bad
The Ghost who Walks would be extremely unhappy to hear you say this.
I can't believe this is the first post to get my main point.
And the Ghost who walks should go back to where he came from and stop taking our jobs and our women! Damn clear-skins.
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2GB is now the standard (and I think LARGEST) plan you can get on AT&T.
1GB seems odd - think AT&T's were 250M and 2GB last I checked.
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I'm on an "unlimited" 500MB deal with Orange. I've yet to reach my limit because there is usually a wifi connection around.
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I think every kind of phantom is bad
You're clearly not an audio technician [wikipedia.org].
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And when I did have the data plan, my usage was approximately 150 MBs a month down and 60 MBs a month up.
200k almost enough for me (Score:2)
I have an iPhone on AT&T. Currently I subscribe to the 2GB plan but the reality is that I use just over 200kb a month (just enough I can't get the cheapest plan).
I use the phone all the time for data, so how can I use so little? It's because most of the time I'm at home or work, both places with WiFi. In-between the largest data use is either browsing or network map loading from Waze, a free driving/gps applciation I leave on whenever I drive.
There are LOTS of people that would have plenty of room in
Re:Good job, Microsoft (Score:5, Insightful)
If it was the FBI or CIA or NSA I would still mind, but it wouldn't be THAT huge a deal, mainly because:
A. They will track me anyway if they have any reason to.
B. They aint got shit on me.
C. The chances of them actually bugging me are about .001%
I'm more worried about it being someone who is going to try to sell me shit. Because the likelihood of them actually bugging me is almost 100%.
Re:Good job, Microsoft (Score:4, Insightful)
Right - the risk of getting bugged by FBI is usually lower than the risk of getting your identity stolen and abused.
At least that applies to most of us.
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I may just be too uncool, but I honestly don't do or say anything that would be worth the time of law enforcement.
I'm not saying its ok to just track everything everyone says, that would be a horrible practice, I'm just saying I'm close to the bottom of the list.
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I'm just saying I'm close to the bottom of the list.
Very subtle.
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I think he meant "bugging" in the sense of "annoying," not "wiretapping." His point, I think was that he doesn't really care if the FBI is wiretapping him because they almost certainly will never bother him or waste his time, but advertisers almost certainly will.
Ahh, I didn't think that wording out. Thank you.
I should add though that I do indeed care, I'm just not panicking about it. If the FBI follows me for a month it will be a unnecessary invasion of my privacy and I will be upset, but I won't be outright panicking is because at the end of that month the FBI will be bored out of their minds and move on to someone worth following.
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I like how you said "they ain't got shit on me" rather than "I haven't done anything". ;-)
A and B are mutually exclusive (Score:2)
A. They will track me anyway if they have any reason to.
B. They aint got shit on me.
If they keep tracking you, they will have pretty soon.
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Re:Good job, Microsoft (Score:5, Informative)
Look, I own a Windows phone (not 7 it's 6.1 then flashed it to 6.5) . I hate Windows for many reasons. I think it's slow (granted, the hardware is not top of the line), it's cumbersome, and there are next to no apps for it.
But the claim that a windows phone has to be rebooted every other day or that one gets BSODs on a windows phone -- that's pure crap. The phone is not rock solid, but it easily runs for months on end with no problem. The few times i've actually had to reboot my windows phone was either because i was flashing an updated ROM or because I was trying to see if the signal issues were caused by the OS (they weren't).
So given that winmo 6.5 is decently stable, why would you FUD about phone 7?
For me the biggest issues with windows mobile 6.5 are: slow startup, slow GUI, poor app market. Each of these is a huge minus for winmo compared to the competition. But I would not complain about the phone's stability.
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I agree here. Early versions of WinCE were awful. Same with trying to actually shove Windows into a phone.
But later revisions of Windows Mobile, along with Windows Phone 7, have no real connection to Windows other than riding the marketing coattails of Windows.
I've been using Windows Mobile since WM5 (original AT&T Tilt) and it is actually a great operating system for power users. It was one of the better choices until Android matured (Android 2.x).
My next phone will be Android based, since Microsoft
Re:"Unnamed third party service" being (Score:5, Insightful)
It'll probably turn out to be either a crucial app vendor or a launch partner that they don't want to annoy - e.g. if it turned out that one of the HTC apps or the Facebook app was doing it. Until they know for sure, and work out how to fix it they probably want to be a little coy about what's causing it.
Anyway, it's not affecting that many users as far as I can tell. I've got an HTC Mozart for work that's not doing it, after checking my data usage.
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Either way, how come it doesn't ask for permission to transmit (and detail what gets transmitted), like most modern smartphones require? You know, that privacy thing everyone keeps harping on?
That alone would (well, should) make people leery before buying one.
Re:"Unnamed third party service" being M$ (Score:5, Interesting)
If At&T is the primary service then Windows Live is a third party to that service. Since Microsoft did not name themselves as the culprit, they are in fact an Unnamed service. And of course why would Microsoft want to piss off their own their own management, or worse, to let potential buyers know what the real problem is?
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- Dan.
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How much time must MS devote to a single application before they release it? You can't reasonably expect that they look at every line of code and use the program for weeks before accepting it. The Washington Post wrote that many people believe this 3rd party app to be an email program:
http://voices.washingtonpost.com/fasterforward/2011/01/microsoft_ids_wp7_third-party.html [washingtonpost.com]
The only function of an email program is to send and receive data. I'm sure that in their testing they made sure it did what it said i
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I don't know how it's done at Microsoft, but I am familiar with a few "Fortune 500"'s and their SOP, and you'd be surprised to know how few of them actually believe in consumer testing. Failing to do this is no one's fault but the manufacturer's despite your apologist stance.
If you put your name on a product and make money from a product, you are responsible for that product and all the good and bad that goes with it - especially if the problem comes about through regular everyday use and not extreme or abu