Has anyone else noticed that it's impossible to "disable" data now?
Producers from AutomateIT have told me that this is a new feature within Google and that only rooted devices can disable data now.
This is extremely inconvenient.
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My wife got a Skyrocket in December and as of January 18, it started sending a TON of data. I'm talking GBs at a time. The first night it sent 4GB and thereafter it's 500MB-1.5GB here and there. Obviously this is busting our extra gigabyte purchases pretty quickly.
I've installed a couple of per-app monitoring applications. TrafficStats allowed me to show system applications and filter to network data only. It shows the data was sent (not received) in the total, but doesn't attribute it to any application. Right now it's over 731MB but the Gmail app, which has used the most, is at 31MB.
It seems to happen whether or not Wifi is enabled and connected. Turning packet data off does stop the traffic.
What can I do to figure out when this is? I have ADB working and root access, but not sure how to go about seeing which app is doing this.
Thanks!
I m guessing its CIQ that's sends this much ****ttttttttt so just disable ciq and it will hopefully stop sending!!!!!
avengerp said:
My wife got a Skyrocket in December and as of January 18, it started sending a TON of data. I'm talking GBs at a time. The first night it sent 4GB and thereafter it's 500MB-1.5GB here and there. Obviously this is busting our extra gigabyte purchases pretty quickly.
I've installed a couple of per-app monitoring applications. TrafficStats allowed me to show system applications and filter to network data only. It shows the data was sent (not received) in the total, but doesn't attribute it to any application. Right now it's over 731MB but the Gmail app, which has used the most, is at 31MB.
It seems to happen whether or not Wifi is enabled and connected. Turning packet data off does stop the traffic.
What can I do to figure out when this is? I have ADB working and root access, but not sure how to go about seeing which app is doing this.
Thanks!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I removed CIQ via the commands here: http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1399429&highlight=remove+ciq
We'll see if that helps. Would CIQ really transfer gigabytes at a time? Is it sending real-time video back to AT&T in addition to keylogging??
If anyone else has a good tool to monitor the traffic I'd still be interested.
Download / Install "My Data Manager" (free) from Market.. it will show every app/service using data, wifi... and how much.
Unfortunately I'm having a problem finding any apps that support AT&T LTE interface monitoring.
I can, however, see some traffic flying by on tcpdump over adb (on rmnet_sdio0 which I think is the mobile interface). But there's no way to tell which app it's coming from.
download "Data Usage Defender" its the best data/wifi monitoring. It tells you exactly what apps sent and received how much data, over what network 3G/4G/Wifi, it monitors and can cut off your data connection to a pre-set limit you chose, it also gives you realtime speed from a little windows under your status bar. I've had it, but since i have 10Gb of data and NEVER go over i uninstalled it
Thanks! Data Usage Defender seems pretty great, and was able to catch all the traffic. I just watched the 'Email' app send 50MB in about 45 seconds while receivinf 4.4kb.
Now to figure out why...or just uninstall email and switch entirely to the gmail app. Has anyone else experienced this?
IP Table based Android firewall apps (i.e., DroidWall, LBE Privacy Guard) are known to provide a good measure for preventing applications accessing the internet. However, during the boot time, while they are not fully loaded in the background yet the phone might still be vulnerable.
It might have not occurred but there is actually a very simple solution to the above problem. Disabling the Data service before restarting the phone will leave no chance an application can get a chance to transmit data on the startup process. The option to disable/enable data is normally found under the Data Delivery from the Settings menu.
Also on my Motorola Atrix I found when data is disabled the phone starts a bit quicker for obvious reasons -- any apps that allowed to access the internet does not perform its tasks i.e. weather widgets.
I'm sorry if this tip was already a widely known knowledge. Hope it helps someone new in Android world.
When using the internet on your device that has an active carrier data plan and no WIFI network is available, the device automatically switch to carrier's data plan.
There are many instances where people with limited monthly plans have run into bloated bills due to unintentional excess data usage.
I searched far and wide across the forums, to find any tips, tricks, tools or best practices for optimized data usage, but could not find much.
This is my humble attempt to come up with such a list.
Hopefully this will help someone avoid those surprise excess usages and bloated bills.
Please bare with me if this is insufficient or if the information herein becomes outdated due to new features in latest Android versions.
I'm not an expert. I am kind of a half-noob myself
1. Install a Data Monitor application.
There are applications which help you monitor data usage.
They show how much usage has happened through carrier's packet data and how much is through WIFI.
They also show data usage per application.
If your ROM does not already have these features, there are so many applications available on the android market (Google play store).
Search for one that suits your needs. I personally prefer My Data Manager
Note that all these data monitor applications monitor the usage at real-time.
That means, they can only monitor your usage form the day you installed them. Don't wait till you run into an excess usage problem, install one now.
2. Explicitly turn off packet-data during huge WIFI downloads.
If you are downloading huge data over WIFI (say a 600 MB file), and in-between if your WIFI becomes unavailable, chances are that the phone switches automatically to carrier data and continues with the download.
This is a sure shot scenario to cause surprise excess usage.
The WIFI might become unavailable due to any number of reasons like:
Straying out of the signal area - if you are moving around
Source getting disconnected - I have a cabled broadband with unlimited data on my laptop, I make my laptop a WIFI hotspot (kind of reverse tethering) using a USB adapter (wireless N150 USB adapter from buffalo). Whenever there is a power cut, my broadband connection goes off until I manually reconnect. Also, my connection periodically times off if it's on for a long time, or my laptop might restart.
The router might malfunction or in worst case, the phone's WIFI connectivity might itself dysfunction.
The point is, keep in mind that the WIFI can go off half way through the download and you might end up using carrier data.
The best solution is to turn off your carrier data. [Uncheck Settings -> Wireless and network -> Mobile networks -> Use packet data]
You can turn it on once the download finishes or once you have stopped/paused the download and you are sure that it won't use up your packet data.
This way, you can ensure that you are actually downloading through WIFi.
3. Firewall - allow/disallow data access to individual applications.
There are firewall applications on the market that allow you to:
Block internet access to selected apps.
Many apps like offline games and simple tools require full internet access permission. At first glance, this looks suspicious as these apps do not seem to have any business going online.
The main reason most of them use this permission is to allow in-app Ads.
By using firewalls, you can block internet access to selected apps that do not require internet access for their normal functioning.
Separate packet (3G/GPRS) and WIFI data.
Some apps consume too much data, like Facebook, Google plus and some games.
If you don't need to be online on these apps all the time, you can allow them only WIFI access, so that they can sync only when WIFI becomes available and they can never use up your carrier data.
Toggle blocking status.
Useful when you want to occasionally turn it on for a while.
There are many such firewall apps available on the market and some antivirus apps also come with inbuilt firewall features.
I personally use DroidWall
Note:
Provide access to all android system applications, and apps which come pre-configured from your vendor (I guess they could be trusted)
Make sure all apps that require internet access are given the access - both in WIFI and 3G mode.
Make sure known data guzzlers are denied access - both WIFI and 3G (provided they do not require access for their normal functionality)
If in doubt about any particular app - I prefer to provide it access. Better safe, than risk impaired functionality.
4. Download Manager - pause/resume downloads.
Say you are downloading about 10MB of data and the connection drops when you are about 8MB completed.
At this situation, you do not want to start downloading from scratch again when connection becomes available.
This way, if you are moving in and out of connection, you will end up trying to download the same data again and again, drastically increasing the usage.
You need a download manager with pause, resume, auto resume features to handle this situation.
There are many available on the market, search and use a one that best suits your needs.
This works only for downloading from browser links, dropbox, etc.
The download manager does not come into picture if you are trying to download data directly from an app (like many games download huge data when started for the first time after installation).
I am yet to find an app which can handle this kind of situation. Something like - intercept any downloads initiated from within other apps, and provide you option to manage those downloads.
If anyone knows of any such app, please do update us.
However, most games and apps which do huge data download have inbuilt capability to manage the download.
For example, Sygic has an excellent download manager that manages maps and other downloads for it. It comes by default with Sygic.
5. Push Notification Detectors.
When you install certain applications, they might have tie-ups with certain advertisers to send add notifications directly to your device's notification bar.
Such ads are called push notification ads. They allow the developers to make some revenue and help keep the free applications free.
These notifications show up on your notification area periodically, even when the original application which installed them is not running.
As of now, I cannot find any statics/benchmarks to understand how much data push-notifications consume. But they definitely do consume some data.
It is a personal choice whether you want such notifications or not, I personally feel a little bit of data usage is OK, as it is a small price to pay and helps the developers.
But some applications might be tied up with greedy advertising schemes that do extensive push notifications and consume excessive data.
One best way is to go through the apps description carefully before installing.
If the developer clearly states that the app uses push notification adds, it shows some responsibility on the developer’s part and you can assume he has taken the steps to ensure that the notifications are not excessive and does not consume excess data.
You can then choose to either install or not install the application.
However, there are many applications which are silent about the fact that they use push notifications.
There are many detectors on the market which detect all the installed apps on your device which appear to use known notification Ad frameworks.
They do not block the Ads, but inform you which applications are causing them. You can then choose to uninstall those applications or give them only WIFI data access or freeze them for a certain period of time to monitor your data consumption.
I personally use AirPush Detector
6. Freeze / Unfreeze applications.
If you suspect some application to be causing excess data consumption through push ads, you can freeze it for certain time and monitor the data usage to check if there is any significant change.
There are many such applications on the market which allow you to freeze/unfreeze select apps.
Most of them require root access (I do not know of any such app which works without root)
Titanium Backup (Requires Root) is the best application out there as per my opinion.
It does much more than freeze/unfreeze. It's a must have app for any root user.
PS:
Be very careful which apps you decide to freeze.
There are many apps that should not be frozen, especially system apps and some of those that come preinstalled on your ROM.
If you try to freeze any such app which should not be frozen, you might render your phone unusable.
Please refer threads related to your device to get a list of safe-to-freeze apps for your particular device.
Rooting might void warranty and has an associated risk of rendering your device unusable if done improperly.
If you are unfamiliar with concepts, read through the forums here on XDA, use the search button
This is all I can think of for now.
If you have any more useful tips/tricks or best practices related to data usage, please add them here, so that it can help others as well.
Cheers,
Sandeep
I know that the battery life issue after 5.1 has been addressed in these forums, but I want to make a specific thread about this problem in particular that many other are experiencing too and it doesn't seem to be addressed in here, at least not recently (There's a thread from 2012 that doesn't give much info).
So the thing is that ever since updating to 5.1, my battery doesn't last nearly as long as it used to. I'm using a couple of apps to try to diagnose the problem and I've found a this particular wakelock: bam_dmux_wakelock is what's keeping my phone awake. I also noticed that Google Play Services is what's using more energy than it used to. This wakelock is only present when using mobile data, although when using wifi the wlan wakelock family is also present, but those wakelock are not as long as the bam_dmux_wakelock, but they do keep the phone awake for a considerable amount of time.
Booting in safe mode does not help. Restricting mobile data access to Google Play Store and Google Play Services makes no difference either. I did some Googling and learned that I can disable some Google Services that were always running: BackupTransportService (I have backup disabled), WearableService (No idea why this was running since I've never even turned on bluetooth since I updated to 5.1, let alone pair my device with any wearable device), AnalyticsService and DeviceConnectionServiceBroker.
No dice. Wakelock is still keeping the phone awake.
There' still 5 other services that I'm not sure I should disable: GMSCoreStatsService (No idea what this does), GoogleLocationService and GoogleLocationManagerService (I don't why these are running since location has been disabled for weeks), PendingIntentCallbackService (No idea what this does), ConfigFetchService (No idea) an GCM Service (I think this is important, it has to do with push notification).
If you have more info on these services, please let me know. I don't want to mess with anything I don't know. I've stopped the location services but they come right back up. No idea why.
So, summing up, this is what I know:
- The bam_dmux_wakelock is responsabile for keeping my phone awake
- It only appears when in mobile data (not in WIFI)
- Google Play Services is what's using more energy than before
- Disabling sync does not help
- I've made two factory resets (from settings and from recovery), nothing.
- Restricting mobile data access to Google Play Store and GP Services makes no difference
- Disabling running services doesn't help either.
Is anybody else experiencing this and did you find a solution? I'm getting real sick of this, and I'm considering flashing a custom ROM for the first time in my life.
Please support and sign the petition so Google can reconsider the mobile data toggle in future Android releases. What I know they disabled it for security reasons, although it was very drasticaly and I think they can do something better, and enable it for some apps or anything they have in mind.
Not many voices has been voiced about this since they disabled it, although I think there are many that are annoyed that we no longer can toggle the mobile data.
Ever since Android 4.+ the automatic mobile data toggle has been disabled by Google. No longer can 3rd party apps auto toggle mobile data on/off with a trigger e.g. when you turn off/on the screen.
This is limitation for many reasons. People not wishing to be radiated all the time, or not wanting to pay for traffic for background operations when phone is not actively in use.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
https://www.change.org/p/google-inc-mobile-data-toggle-for-android
Sign and spread!
nicoX said:
Please support and sign the petition so Google can reconsider the mobile data toggle in future Android releases. What I know they disabled it for security reasons, although it was very drasticaly and I think they can do something better, and enable it for some apps or anything they have in mind.
Not many voices has been voiced about this since they disabled it, although I think there are many that are annoyed that we no longer can toggle the mobile data.
https://www.change.org/p/google-inc-mobile-data-toggle-for-android
Sign and spread!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Not sure what you are talking about as the data toggle is still available in android and never went anywhere.
What that states is apps can't mess with the toggle which it shouldn't. Disabling data on a smartphone kinda defeats the purpose.