In North America, using Xfinity for reference. I want to create both a home NAS and offline Wiki/media backup. Problem is to get the amount of data I need would blow through my plan and throttle my speed. I guess I could try and do it over a longer period or download just before the billing cycle renews so even if I go over it will reset. I would rather avoid these scenarios, the only other thing I can think of is using a cafe or library connection, that might be what I have to do. Any ideas on places to download massive amounts of data or ways to get around throttling? Thanks in advance.
ISPs still have data caps?
That should be outlawed by now.
Yeah I have a 3TB data cap with Proximus on Belgium. Telenet never had a cap, but both mobile and landline signal where I moved to is far better with Proximus.
I am hoping that is counts for downloads only and not uploads (seeding)
Absolute robbery, but at least the prices are around half of what I paid in the US for phone and internet. 70€ vs $145.
I’ve never heard of caps here in the US, except on mobile plans. But that is more that they throttle you after so many TB’s
You could:
- Ask your neighbor if he has unmetered Internet connection and if so, then chip in (⚠️ This may be against their operator’s terms of service. Before doing so, please check the terms of service)
- Ask a friend with unmetered connection to download all the stuff for you and just hand you the disk
- Use a public hotspot (such as McDonald’s Free WiFi) to download this stuff. Take into account that the download speed will be extremely slow.
- Rent a server in the datacenter (i.e. VPS), download the data there, and get the data using your connection only as much as you need at the moment. The disadvantage is that you don’t really own the data stored on this server.
This is very technical but if your ISP has unmetered Netflix or Spotify you could have a VPN on a server that spoofs the hostname (easier) or IP (harder) which only works for downloading and i imagine using >50GB of data to Spotify might make the ISP ask some questions. Netflix would be easier since 4k movies are a thing
You got downvoted, but some researchers discovered this works on some cellphone networks. They only look at what the site calls itself and not what the site actually is.
not just researchers, i used this all the time back when data was much more costly and i had only 3 gigs a month, but they patched it after a couple years
basically when i was out of data a page from the isp’s website would pop up saying “Buy more data”, and that’s all i needed to spoof
That’s actually a decent idea. I’m looking at another solution but that might actually help me mask another project that will use very little data. Thanks
The easiest/safest way would be to adjust your plan, even though it would cost a bit more and feel kinda shitty. I’m pretty sure they offer an unlimited bandwidth “upgrade” for residential plans at like $10-15/mo, and all business plans should be uncapped.
You could try to spoof your traffic somehow, but I could never get that to work reliably when I had caps. And the overage fees were worse than just paying ahead of time.
Thanks
https://github.com/ValdikSS/GoodbyeDPI
This software designed to bypass Deep Packet Inspection systems found in many Internet Service Providers which block access to certain websites.
It handles DPI connected using optical splitter or port mirroring (Passive DPI) which do not block any data but just replying faster than requested destination, and Active DPI connected in sequence.
Thanks, I’m going to look at this documentation.
I heard some people would do ‘domain fronting’ to mask packages as going to a web that was unmetered (e.g. Google or the providers own site). But I never tried it, only heard of the trick when it was too old (counter back measures finally catch up). But you can try… there it’s, that rabbit hole… GL&HF!
Thanks for the info
Can you not afford to pay for the cap to be removed? I do that, it’s like $15/month extra or something.
Ive notice they not meter the Xfinity Free wifi SSID that their rented modem provides. The one where you login with your xfinity account “on-the-go”. Its intended for when you are away from home. But I know someone who used it to bypass the metering.
That’s not bad, I bought my modem and router, so it doesn’t put out their sideload network but I could use my access to that. Thanks.
Do you have cell service at your house at all?
Yeah, I have pretty decent 5g coverage.
I have a t-mobile gateway with no cap. My phone is t-mobile so I pay $30 a month (no taxes/extras) for it. I believe if it’s your only thing you want from t-mobile it’s $50 a month.
At least in my area the speeds are plenty fast, ping is around 45, and I think I’ve lost connection that I noticed a couple times in the last year, and not for very long. A lot more consistent connection than my cable internet was.
I suggest having t-mobile send you their gateway and trying it. It’s no charge if you decide you don’t want it within the first two weeks and it’s just month to month billing so no contract bullshit.
That’s a good idea. Thanks.
leeching off a public wifi will be less reliable, probably significantly slower, and possibly subject to (unknown to you) use limits of their own.
pretty sure your provider has an unlimited option for a little more per-month. just upgrade to that for awhile, then go back to the capped plan when you’re no longer going over its limit.
if you need to stay within a provider’s monthly limit, just set ‘speed limits’ on your downloads so you won’t go over for a month, and also so you have some bandwidth, and quota, leftover for other online ‘activities’.
you could throttle your own connection to 1,157,407 bits per second (about 1 Mbps) and you’d run out every 30 days, assuming the 3 TB cap.
