iPhone Tethering and MMS Hacks Surface

[andyplace]

Has it stayed like that?

I can only get tethering to work, if I enable VVM it disables tethering after a few seconds.

If that works what method did you use? I have AT&T.

The ipcc that is floating around sets the type mask to -2. This sets data, tether, mms, voicemail all to cingular.wap

Tether, MMS, Data, all seem to coöperate with cingular.wap as the APN. Voicemail does not. Editing voicemail changes the type mask to one that disables tethering, even though the carrier bundle sets voicemail to acds.voicemail.

Solution: Use a different type mask , (-3 or -4), so voicemail can be set correctly by the carrier bundle and keep MMS + tethering + data support all intact.

Pre-Prepared IPCC: http://bit.ly/15EQv0

 

[Braindead360]

I have to wonder how AT&T plans to stop this. From what I can tell, they have no way of knowing who's tethering and who's not. Something tells me that even when their tethering service is officially released, people are still going to figure out how to bypass it since the functionality is built into the Os. I think the only way that they could stop this is by having Apple remove it from the Os, and then have Apple develop a version of the Os that can only be downloaded by authorized tethering subscribers. However, even that is a stretch. I personally think AT&T should just lower their prices of their Air Card service to $30 a month, and allow anyone with a data plan and tethering abilities to tether at a 5gb cap. Apparently Rogers up in Canada does this, and you don't see their network falling off into the ocean.

 

[keenan wolf]

so now that i have the cellular data network setting what are the apn, username ... etc. i did the wap cingular one and still no mms. idk what to do!

 

[xendofnothing]

ATT is taking advantage of a large and loyal customer base, FORCED into loyalty by immoral exclusivity deals. .

You should really have called the cops when those dudes shoved a gun to your head and FORCED you into a contract you knew you were signing. Or maybe they used a special magical potion that made you blind, deaf and dumb when you were buying the phone - not conscious of the deal you were signing.

I am a happy and loyal iPhone user but am sick of the complaining over not having the full subsidy or having to pay for tethering. When I bought my iPhone 3G, I was definitely aware it was a two year contract and that I wouldn't be eligibile for an upgrade for at least 18 months. It would be the same if you bought an iPhone 3G and some cool non-iPhone came out and would be forced to pay the non-subsidized price. Honestly, I feel that AT&T and Apple were kind with the early upgrade price - they didn't HAVE to. It's nice that they did but they didn't HAVE to.

Listen, I'm annoyed by the MMS and I'm not the biggest fan of AT&T but some people just like complaining just for complaining.

 

[D-Love]

The ipcc that is floating around sets the type mask to -2. This sets data, tether, mms, voicemail all to cingular.wap

Tether, MMS, Data, all seem to coöperate with cingular.wap as the APN. Voicemail does not. Editing voicemail changes the type mask to one that disables tethering, even though the carrier bundle sets voicemail to acds.voicemail.

Solution: Use a different type mask , (-3 or -4), so voicemail can be set correctly by the carrier bundle and keep MMS + tethering + data support all intact.

Pre-Prepared IPCC: http://bit.ly/15EQv0

That download gave me a folder labeled "Payload" with ATT_us.bundle in it. What do I do with this, just use the option/restore click and set the carrier settings with that?

 

[jb510]

I am a happy and loyal iPhone user but am sick of the complaining over not having the full subsidy or having to pay for tethering. When I bought my iPhone 3G, I was definitely aware it was a two year contract and that I wouldn't be eligibile for an upgrade for at least 18 months. It would be the same if you bought an iPhone 3G and some cool non-iPhone came out and would be forced to pay the non-subsidized price. Honestly, I feel that AT&T and Apple were kind with the early upgrade price - they didn't HAVE to. It's nice that they did but they didn't HAVE to.

Listen, I'm annoyed by the MMS and I'm not the biggest fan of AT&T but some people just like complaining just for complaining.

Well I'm with you on half of that... I too think the bitching and moaning about not being able to upgrade for the subsidized price is ridiculous. You people signed a 2 year contract, you got a subsidized phone for doing so... Do you think if Apple announce the iPhone Pro next month that you should get to upgrade to that at a subsidized price even though they just subsidized your 3GS?

...but further here is why AT&T's plans are BS. IF in fact you are getting a subsidized phone for signing a 2year contract at whatever those rates are, then IF you aren't getting a subsidy shouldn't you get a cheaper rate plan? If I bring my own phone (say I buy an unlocked iPhone from Italy/HK) should I get a better monthly rate plan since they aren't trying to make up for the subsidy the would have otherwise given me?

No... they don't... they don't offer ANY cheaper options if you bring your own phone, or even if you buy a no-commit phone from them at full price.. YOU STILL HAVE TO SIGN A CONTRACT FOR SERVICE ON A 3GS. That's utter complete total cow feces.


However regarding the tethering I totally disagree. AT&T's terms of service are ridiculous (yes I've read them and why I'm not on a contract), basically they say you can do email and basic web browsing, and that's it... no streaming, no P2P, no ftp, no file transferring, no... no... no... While the ToS may say this, there sales people and advertising suggest the opposite. They suggest it's unlimited internet to do everything you can on your home computer. I adamantly believe in net neutrality and that data service needs to be separated from the hardware layer to achieve it, not just in regards to mobile data but with wired broadband as well. Yes I'm saying I actually think not only should you be able to do WTF you want with your allotment of 5GB at 3/7Mbps, but that you ought to be able to get the actual data serviced by any ISP you want... even on mobile.

 

[TrEyHoLyO]

That download gave me a folder labeled "Payload" with ATT_us.bundle in it. What do I do with this, just use the option/restore click and set the carrier settings with that?

Go to your Trash folder and take out the zip file. Open the get info button. and delete the zip off the end of it. That will do it for you. You can delete the payload folder

 

[D-Love]

Go to your Trash folder and take out the zip file. Open the get info button. and delete the zip off the end of it. That will do it for you. You can delete the payload folder

Cool, has anyone else used this method and can confirm it works? What I have now works, and all I'm missing is visual voicemail - which I didn't set up for a while anyway. But if this is a confirmed fix that enables VV and even MMS along with tethering I'll consider giving it a go.

 

[TrEyHoLyO]

Cool, has anyone else used this method and can confirm it works? What I have now works, and all I'm missing is visual voicemail - which I didn't set up for a while anyway. But if this is a confirmed fix that enables VV and even MMS along with tethering I'll consider giving it a go.

This is what i did on mine. To fix VV just call your phone from another line and leave the iphone a message. Let it download to the phone to tell you that you have a voice message. That fixed mine hopefully it works for you

 

[Mlrollin91]

Question...

Once AT&T does release MMS and everything, if you already have 5.0 on your phone, does anyone think that will conflict in the future?

 

[eastercat]

Since I hate text messages, I only used the tethering instructions. It works like a charm and was embarrassingly easy to set up. If this isn't shut down by AT&T or Apple, I'm going to feel sorry for the PDAnet people.
Considering how hard AT&T is going to probably clamp down, I'll be using this sparingly until I know the repercussions.

 

[AdamO79PL]

If I was an ******* I would ROFL away... I'm from Poland and we have MMS and tethering right from the start (3.0 soft) and it's for free. It's very difficult for me to understand why Apple isn't showing the AT&T the finger or why AT&T isn't providing you guys with these services. Wired I tell you...

Anyway... Good luck.

 

[BIG BOSS]

I can't believe you've done this.

 

[PRSplayer]

Does anyone know exactly how to restore completely to factory settings, so that the tethering option is not available anymore?

I have a 3GS, and used the automated method at http://help.benm.at/usa.php. I then used the terminal command with "FALSE" and re-installed the normal 4.0 carrier file. Rebooted, still have the tethering option. Reset network settings, still have the tethering option.

My phone has a rattle, and I am exchanging it for a new phone today. Just don't want any issues in the event they look for tethering (highly doubtful). I'm trying a restore to original settings now, hopefully that will fix it.

Any thoughts?

UPDATE - see post #241

 

[mkstevenskm]

Does anyone know exactly how to restore completely to factory settings, so that the tethering option is not available anymore?

I have a 3GS, and used the automated method at http://help.benm.at/usa.php. I then used the terminal command with "FALSE" and re-installed the normal 4.0 carrier file. Rebooted, still have the tethering option. Reset network settings, still have the tethering option.

My phone has a rattle, and I am exchanging it for a new phone today. Just don't want any issues in the even they look for tethering (highly doubtful). I'm trying a restore to original settings now, hopefully that will fix it.

Any thoughts?

Did the full restore work?

 

[PRSplayer]

Did the full restore work?

The full restore worked, and removed the tethering option. I checked settings while iTunes asked me which backup I wanted to restore my data from (after the firmware factory restore), and the tethering option was gone, and looked normal. But then, I foolishly selected my latest backup to get my data back, and the stupid tethering option was back after that.

So, if you restore to factory settings, either setup as a new phone, or from a pre-tethering hack backup if you want the true original settings.

 

[SFStateStudent]

Tethering is going fine on this end. A bit slower than my WiFi or Cable, but nice for on the go: (Also have MMS that works like a charm.....)

 

[aarcarr]

The full restore worked, and removed the tethering option. I checked settings while iTunes asked me which backup I wanted to restore my data from (after the firmware factory restore), and the tethering option was gone, and looked normal. But then, I foolishly selected my latest backup to get my data back, and the stupid tethering option was back after that.

So, if you restore to factory settings, either setup as a new phone, or from a pre-tethering hack backup if you want the true original settings.

No, you dont have to restore at all. If you deleted that profile from that site and still have the tethering option "available". Click it and enable it, it will disappear after a few seconds.

 

[ericksgotmac]

Um.. So I tried both the iTunes .ipcc on my PC and the automated one from the help.benm.at site and Tethering works PERFECTLY but MMS doesn't work =\ This is what I did--

After all the .ipcc upgrade I

1. Turned my iPhone off and removed the SIM
2. Put my SIM into a RAZRV3 and made a few calls with it
3. After my phone registered on my AT&T online account I chose the non-iPhone texting

I put my SIM back into my iPhone 3G and tried to tether and it worked fine. I then tried to send MMS to people and none would send... They sent me some MMS and I didn't receive it =\ Does anyone have any ideas? I even put all the MMS info in the settings.

 

[SFStateStudent]

For those of you that can't get this stuff working right and want to reset everything back to normal settings. If you want to remove the tethering that you got from help.BenM.at and doesn't go away even after a reboot. Go to Settings> General> Network click on the tethering and enable. It will disappear after a few seconds.

To go back to carrier file 4.0, you need to do the same thing you did for loading 5.0

If you download the carrier file with Safari and it opens as 'ATT Bundle' and has that lego looking icon, you need to go to Safari Preferences and uncheck "Open 'safe' files after downloading" then it should download in '.zip' format. Right click file> Get info and remove the '.zip' extension and click 'use .ipcc"
Now it should be ready to use in iTunes

Um.. So I tried both the iTunes .ipcc on my PC and the automated one from the help.benm.at site and Tethering works PERFECTLY but MMS doesn't work =\ This is what I did--

I followed the post listed above you: Just locate that post and select that AT&T 5 file....

Downloaded the ATT 5 and went to my library and opened up iTunes and then clicked on iPhone Carrier and placed that ATT 5 file in the iPhone Carrier file, then went to iTunes and did click option and clicked on that file, then clicked on open, then turned off my iPhone and turned it back on and everything was good to go.....

 

[ericksgotmac]

Yea, thats what I did and rebooted my iPhone and it still gives me a little exclamation point in a read circle and a message saying that it failed to send and I should try again later?

 

[PRSplayer]

No, you dont have to restore at all. If you deleted that profile from that site and still have the tethering option "available". Click it and enable it, it will disappear after a few seconds.

Hi, I saw your post about that earlier, and it didn't work for me. Dunno why, but I tried everything people posted, multiple times. The only thing that worked and removed the tethering option was to restore to original settings and to a backup that was done prior to making the ipcc changes in the first place.

Oh well, the whole point of me doing it was that I had to exchange the phone for a new one, which I've done. Now I can go back to tethering.

 

[sschwar4]

I'm curious how 'block-able' this loophole is - here's to hoping that AT&T can't do anything about it and simply has to deal with us.

The will figure a way to push a provider profile to overwrite what is there. It seems they have done that with a few already. Earlier in the week, tethering was working, then it changed and the button now said Enable Tethering, then contact AT&T for the appropriate plan. One of the others is still working.

As for the tethering as a whole. I was one of the lucky ones to get Netshare before it was removed from iTunes. I have been using for tethering for more than a year now. Looking at the history, I don't see a huge increase in data usage, maybe 10%. That will be hard for AT&T to track.

Now, for those that plan on using 100% for data, they will catch that.

 

[D-Love]

Um.. So I tried both the iTunes .ipcc on my PC and the automated one from the help.benm.at site and Tethering works PERFECTLY but MMS doesn't work =\ This is what I did--

I followed the post listed above you: Just locate that post and select that AT&T 5 file....

Downloaded the ATT 5 and went to my library and opened up iTunes and then clicked on iPhone Carrier and placed that ATT 5 file in the iPhone Carrier file, then went to iTunes and did click option and clicked on that file, then clicked on open, then turned off my iPhone and turned it back on and everything was good to go.....

Is the ATT 5 the ATT_US.ipcc file? It came in a folder labeled "Payload".

 

[mrbrown]

@TheKrillr - I know tethering this way doesn't work right now for 2G iPhones, because the IPCC files are for 3G phones, but do you think there is anyway to get it to? that is to make an ipcc for the Original iPhone (2G/EDGE).

While Apple has not come out and explicitly said it, according to their online "iPhone How-To Guide", tethering is only available with "the 3G and later".