[NewsPoster]

Seemingly overnight, and in response to a lawsuit, AT&T has modified its terms of service language on a website about LTE speed throttling for its heaviest users. The company now claims that users who have exceeded 5GB on LTE "may experience reduced speeds when using data services at times and in areas that are experiencing network congestion." Previously, LTE users who had used more than 5GB were throttled at all times.


Speeds for throttled LTE users dropped to 0.5Mb/s (about 63KB/s) after the 5GB ceiling was hit. The new terms of service claim that as soon as a user exits the congested area, that speeds will return to normal. Not declared is what metric the company will use to determine if a location is "congested."

AT&T claimed in court about the throttling that "we have been completely transparent with customers since the very beginning. We informed all unlimited data-plan customers via bill notices and a national press release that resulted in nearly 2,000 news stories, well before the program was implemented. In addition, this program has affected only about three percent of our customers; and before any customer is affected, they are also notified by text message."

The bid to cease a US Federal Trade Commission (FTC) lawsuit about the throttling over grounds that the Federal Communications Commission held jurisdiction was denied in Federal Court. The judge denying AT&T's motion wrote in his ruling that "when this suit was filed, AT&T's mobile data service was not regulated as common carrier activity by the Federal Communications Commission. Once the Reclassification Order of the Federal Communications Commission (which now treats mobile data serve as common carrier activity) goes into effect, that will not deprive the FTC of any jurisdiction over past alleged misconduct as asserted in this pending action."

AT&T believes that more than 80 percent of its remaining "unlimited data" customers are on Apple's iPhone. If a customer chooses to shift to another of the company's programs without two-year contracts, the unlimited service is no longer available. The company does not currently offer an unlimited data program for new customers.

It is unclear if AT&T made this move because of the pending implementation of Title II regulation, the FTC lawsuit, or both. Regardless of this change in policy, the company must still face the lawsuit from the FTC.

[benjitek]

I'm one of those AT&T users grandfathered into an unlimited plan. I use 2-3gb per month, occasionally more, so it works out for me.

As far as the new policy goes, kind of perfect for AT&T. Say you call to complain about being throttled, have fun waiting on hold while all those people you get transferred to try to figure out who you're actually supposed to be speaking with. All they have to do is state at that time on that date the cell tower you were connected to was operating at or near peak capacity. Virtually impossible for a customer to dispute. I wouldn't be at all surprised if the AT&T rep didn't go so far as to ask the caller 'if they know which cell tower they were connected to when this happened'... ;-)

[climacs]

also a grandfathered unlimited data customer. Of course the lawsuit had everything to do with this. They are playing nice (or appearing to) until they don't have to any longer.

[farhadd]

Att's highest data plan is 50GB as of today ($375 a month)- shouldn't an "unlimited" customer get greater than or equal to 50GB of data usage without throttling?

[Spudboy2004]

I'm looking forward to seeing what happens in a few days when I use up my 5Gb. Something tells me it's still gonna blow chunks.