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How to bypass Wi-Fi limitations (lemmy.world)

submitted 7 months ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

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Hey everyone, I live in a dorm like apartment where my Internet plan is part of my contract. I have a monthly data limit which just isn't enough for me. Buying additional data is stupid expensive. I found out though that your used data is only calculated once you disconnect from the internet completely. So my idea is to get a small device that is constantly connected. I could use an Amazon echo / Google home, but I'm not comfortable with the idea of having one. Could I just hook up something like a raspberry pie to the Internet and how would I go about ensuring that it has a constant connection? Thanks for your time and sorry for the long post.

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[–] [email protected] 11 points 7 months ago (1 children)

That's gonna be quite the bill when the device does eventually disconnect...

I'd expect it to bill you for the extra data retroactively. (otherwise people would just save all the heavy downloads for the end of the month) I'd also expect it to calculate usage regularly as well as upon disconnect, so this plan wouldn't really work.

If this is really what you want to try though: take a rpi, open a Screen for a persistent terminal, run 'ping google.com' and disconnect from that screen (leaving it to endlessly ping google, at least until it's restarted).

[–] [email protected] 3 points 7 months ago (1 children)

I'm guessing I don't need a new fancy rpi and I can use an older model?

Oh I should have added that the base data is part of my rent. I don't get charged anything until I manually book more data. The way I found out about the loophole is because someone else has been accidentally using it for years now. So I think I'm pretty save.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 7 months ago* (last edited 7 months ago) (1 children)

Na, pretty much anything that'll run linux will do.

Seriously, expect a bill and/or permanently cutoff service when it is discovered.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 7 months ago

Alright thanks, I'll just see this as an experiment. I expect the bills to come in any day. It's worth it either way.

[–] [email protected] 9 points 7 months ago

Sounds like a way to get hit with a large bill when you finally disconnect. It would help to know what kind of monitoring or what service they are using. I would also check your contract to see if they prevent you from getting your own internet service. The whole thing sounds shady AF.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 7 months ago

Just get an old wireless router that can also work as a WiFi extender/access point. Wireless routers have DNS and NTP functions so they consistently call out to servers for these functions, this way you can just connect to your modem which is forwarding the internet from your provider.

You should be able to find a used modem for cheap if you don't already have one spare.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 7 months ago (1 children)

What happens when this device or whatever does eventually disconnect? No more data for the month, or get charged for it?

I'm kinda doing something similar with my phone. It's not supposed to be a hotspot, and I shouldn't have more than 20gb a month... But here I am on month four with 100gb of side loaded hotspot each month.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 7 months ago

No, they just cut it. I had the idea because a neighbor has been using a Google home for this for a while now. We have to manually transfer money to increase our data.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 7 months ago

It would be easy enough to have a raspberry pi always connected that just pings google.com or some other website every few seconds/minutes. I'm not sure that's your best solution or even what the best solution would be, but that would be very easy to set up.