Verizon Cracks Down On Jailbreak Tethering 286
tekgoblin writes "Verizon, like AT&T has now started blocking jailbroken phones from using un-sanctioned tethering apps. Verizon will now require users to be subscribed to a mobile tethering plan to be able to use tethering at all." So which mobile company's actually any good for 3G tethering, voice service aside? My Virgin Mobile MiFi (bought under a plan no longer available) is theoretically unlimited and "only" $40/month, but has had too much downtime for my taste, and atrocious customer service.
Re:How do they tell? (Score:3, Informative)
Highly illegal deep packet inspection. :) It breaks a ton of privacy laws put in place by the Fed AND local governments.
Re:How do they tell? (Score:2, Informative)
Phone based traffic is sent via their WAP gateway where as tethered traffic isn't, at least that's what someone said in a previous article on the subject. If thats true then all they need to do is monitor all non WAP traffic and compare where it's coming from against the people paying for tethering.
This is not true. WAP was for phones before they had browsers that could read full HTML. The WAP server acted as a proxy and converted the HTML down to a subset that the phones could handle. This stopping being true with the advent of modern smartphones that can do standard HTML.
While I can't say for sure, as they could be doing something I'm not aware of, my guess is it's just simple DPI which means the previous posters suggestion of using your tether to make a VPN tunnel back to your home router/server should work. Might need to check for client sigs in VPN tunnel setup as a laptop client like Cisco AnyConnect might give itself away durning initial tunnel setup.
However if you run up the bytes I'm guessing you'll still hear from them.
Re:How do they tell? (Score:5, Informative)
Re:How do they tell? (Score:5, Informative)
It depends on the device you're using.
In Android and Windows Mobile 6.5/6.1/5, your NAI (network access identifier) changes based upon the type of traffic you're pushing. Tethered traffic and DUN changes your NAI to yournumber@dun.vzw3g.com. Traffic from the phone itself is simply yournumber@vzw3g.com.
Verizon has poisoned EVERY phone with Gingerbread - they have modified the OS so that activating any hotspot app, even if the phone is rooted, to trigger the NAI change and show the phrase "Tethering or Hotspot Active." The only SAFE way to tether on a Verizon phone is to run Froyo, then use free-wifi-tether's 3.x version. Alternatively, install CyanogenMod and then you can tether.
For iOS? Hell, you're screwed any way you turn.