This telecom’s data bundles deplete quicker than the other telecom’s data bundles. That is a never ending argument in Uganda with some people backing up their Internet Service Provider over the others. You may be wondering how telecom companies in Uganda calculate your data. In the past few years, there were even allegations that MTN Uganda’s data bundles were being ‘eaten by crocodiles’ given how fast they got used up. According to the tweet below seems others companies are falling in line.
@Airtel_Ug this is ridiculous! How do I subscribe for 120mb and they get depleted within 15 minutes while I am using wifi? #Thievery pic.twitter.com/Qw5njOlMla
— ¶€T€® (@justpierro) September 23, 2016
Keep in mind that in some cases users leave background apps to run or heavy automatic windows updates run depleting their data bundles in the long run. So whether telecom companies cheating us by exaggerating our data usage so that bundles deplete fast is still a matter of contentious debate?
Different telecom companies have different Internet speeds and coverage footprints for 2G, 3G and 4G networks. On a 2G network, the Internet speeds are very low —less than 40Kbps on GPRS. This makes you do less but for long hours. So data bundles tend to last longer but slower on a 2G network. Then for 3G (HSPA+), it provides theoretical download speeds of up to 42Mbps. This is obviously faster than a 2G network and hence you’ll be able to do more with your bundle in a shorter time. Now comes the mighty 4G Internet with theoretical speeds well over 80Mbps.
These blistering speeds will tempt you to use data hungry Internet services like watching HD videos on YouTube at the expense of your data bundle. And of course, it will run out very fast. Different Internet speeds amount to different depletion times. But what if we are having the same Internet connection but different carriers. Do bundles still get depleted at the same rate?
The calculations
This is how telecom companies in Uganda calculate your data usage and then cut you off. It’s impossible to show the methodology of all telecom operators, but there are standard option that telecom companies in Uganda use to measure your data.
*Warning its about to get a little bit technical
When a user connects to the Internet, their data service travels from the phone through the radio access network to reach an SGSN which reaches a GGSN. The SGSN stands for Serving GPRS Support Node and it handles all packet switched data within the network. GGSN stands for Gateway GPRS Support Node and it’s responsible for the inter-working between the GPRS network and external packet switched networks, like the Internet. Basically, an SGSN acts as a kind of anchor for the source of the data and the GGSN acts as a kind of anchor for the destination IP networks being reached (i.e the Internet).
All bytes of data for a given subscriber are being forwarded between the SGSN and GGSN which are associated with the IMSI (International Mobile Subscriber Identity) number of your SIM card and not the IMEI (International Mobile Equipment Identity) of the device. This makes it possible for all these bytes to be counted and made available for post processing. A special GPRS Tunneling Protocol (GTP) is set up on a per phone basis where IP traffic of different individuals is kept separate to allow per user byte counting.
The above records can either be delivered later to a logical Offline Charging Server (OFCS) or immediately to a real time charging server. Telecom companies in Uganda mostly use the real time method. Here, byte counting IP routers report usage as it is happening at charging stations in an Online Charging Server (OCS). This enables extra functions like intelligent URL redirects by the telecom network, redirecting the user to a web page provided by their operator to let them know that their Internet bundle is depleted. There is a lot an operator can do in this part. For example Airtel Uganda makes it easy to subscribe for another bundle of your choice on this page.
Self test to ascertain if a certain telecom cheats in its data calculations
Requirements:
*A fully updated smartphone. (Android would be better since its largely available and easily optimized)
*SIM cards of all the operators you want to out to the test.
*A file on the Internet that you are going to download (it should be downloadable for a couple of times and it should have a direct download link to prevent loading pages)
Conditions:
It’s very hard, almost impossible to have similar carrier conditions In a particular place. Make sure you have at least 3 network bars and in an area with at least 3G network for each carrier.
Procedure:
- Load equal amounts of data on each SIM card. (while still offline)
- Close all applications and even clear them from recent applications so no other applications uses the Internet bundle.
- Make sure you have the conditions in check.
- Use the direct link to download the file and then disconnect data when download ends.
- Check and note down the remaining data.
- Delete the file, switch to another SIM card and repeat the procedure.
- Compare the results.
