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Comment by post_break | Hacker News Reader

Been a T-Mobile customer for ages. Sim swaps are too easy. 2 factor is a joke. This is like the 3rd time my data has been lifted. But I stay with them, why? Because I have 3 free lines, unlimited everything, for $32 a month. They have crazy phone trade in deals from time to time, T-Mobile tuesday usually nets me 15c off per gallon at shell. Am I happy that they keep getting hacked? Absolutely not, but I'm happy pretty much any phone with a sim card works, my bill is low, and I have 5G pretty much everywhere.

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So what you are saying is that the overcall cost of doing business with tmobile (both monetary and your personal data being public) justifies the convenience?

It's not so much the convenience as the problems other carriers bring. T-Mobile has no security, and lousy coverage, and is technically incompetent, but they're fairly honest and customer-friendly.

I could tell a horror story from Verizon about a multi-thousand-dollar roaming bill from someone I knew, from Google about being completely locked out of a phone number forever from another person, and lots of others.

Pick your liability.

On the whole, I found the risk of data theft from T-Mobile to be the lesser of the evils.

TMobile actually has good coverage now. Since the Sprint merger they have started rolling out 5g 600mhz on the old Nextel network. I'm in a rural area and as of last year I can get 90mbps down with TMobile. Verizon and ATT are like 5 and get swamped on weekends.

When it’s really not clear if other options are any more secure then one might as well optimize for the visible features of convenience.

I'm surprised myself to say this - Xfinity Mobile had the best security of all the mobile phone providers. SIM Swap is via a generated code that you have to login to generate. Customer Service verifies a ton of information before they look into your account. It's also generally cheaper than TMobile - but some features are sorely missing/lacking - they're still new.

All that said, Comcast Internet's business practices is outright awful - they lied to me multiple times about my plan and discounts. And you need Comcast to use Xfinity - it's very expensive otherwise.

Convenience is a significant reason why people use Facebook, Zoom, Gmail, etc., despite possible issues from nonfree software.

how on earth do you have 3 lines with unlimited data for 32 a month?

Easy, just hack into their database and add them.

Are you accepting deals for this service?

I have 8 lines in total, three of them free, plus a free unlimited tablet plan.

I have 6 lines, "unlimited" with T-Mobile for around $130 used by various family members. Can't find a better deal than that.

this is crazy what you pay in america, in europe the cheapest unlimited t-mobile plan goes with 90€

Tmobile is technically different companies in Europe and US, although Tmobile in Europe owns 43% of Tmobile US, and interestingly, the German government owns 32% of Tmobile Europe.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/T-Mobile_US

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deutsche_Telekom

Tmobile is also widely considered to be the worst of the 3 US mobile networks (Verizon is considered to have the best coverage, then ATT, then Tmobile). Their pricing reflects that too, as Verizon is the most expensive, then ATT, then Tmobile.

For that price (approx USD 120) I get 4 lines, so my whole family. I'm not happy about the data breach, but I'm very happy with TMobile otherwise, and I seem to have a better deal than my friends on AT&T and others here in the USA.

Technically, it's not unlimited. More like 20-30GB at 5G speeds and everything after at unusable speeds.

I pay about $25 a month for unlimited everything with T Mobile.

How? I have limited data and pay $65? Part of a larger family plan?

Yes you have to go in with at least two other people. Looks like it's going for $30 a month/line right now.

https://www.t-mobile.com/cell-phone-plans/essentials

If you go in with 10 before Sept 15th you can get it for $15/m

Sort of misleading if you mean per line per month

legacy plans

not quite as good a deal, but you can get $15/month with mint mobile, which sits on top of t-mobile's network. supposedly low priority but i've never had a problem in the past twelve months: http://fbuy.me/siAKU

It would be polite to at least disclose that that's a referral link

To clarify this is the fifth data breach in 4 years for T-Mobile.

1 in 2018, 1 in 2019, 2 in 2020.

You forgot the 2015 breach where T mobile customer's SSNs were stolen. This was the one that T-Mobile blamed on Experian and Experian said they were only holding the customer SSN's at T-Mobiles request. See:

https://money.cnn.com/2015/10/01/technology/tmobile-experian...

Similar for me, I have 4 lines (2 I’m using) unlimited everything, no data caps for $100 a month. I looked at other options and there’s nothing close that compares.

Grandfathered "simple choice" plan with 10 lines for $160. I have upgrade to 5G phones with no problems. Not unlimited, but I never use up the data anyway.

I really hope TMO takes security seriously going forward.

...but what do you do with 10 lines?

Friends and family.

The billing is so consistent I just get a check every year from each person. I pay for my parents' lines. And my sis/BIL pay for theirs in one check. I round up a few $ for admin fees.

A completely fantastic deal for the everyone. Would not have been possible with Verizon or ATT as their bills had so many gotchas and varied every month.

Have a large family or a small business?

My wife's immediate family is 9 adults, 6 of whom are all on the same cell plan because it's cheap and convenient for everyone involved. If everyone gets along, there's not a whole lot of downside here.

The biggest security risk with being on someone else's mobile network account in the US is that someone else has control of your phone number.

These days, access to your phone number basically constitutes verification and authorization from you for many things, including transfers of money.

I control the phone lines for myself, my wife, my mom, one of my cousins, and my sister. But I would not give someone other than my wife control of mine or my wife's phone number, no matter how much I trust them.

>If everyone gets along, there's not a whole lot of downside here.

Everyone always gets along, until they do not.

...so you're saying your mom and cousin are doing it, but it's a bad thing that people shouldn't do?

Like, you just provided the counter-example to your own point while making your point.

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