Wifi theft

[Devil2575]

A neighbour of mine has recently been sent a bill for his broadband service which was more than expected due to the download limit being exceeded by some margin. After checking with the supplier it would appear that someone has been streaming data in the early hours of the morning although they refused to tell him what it was. He has been told he is liable and as such is going to pay. For my own interest does anyone know the legalities around this. Does the supplier have to tell him what was being down loaded if he asks? Is he liable? Also is it possible to tell who is doing it and is it actually illegal?

[Devil2575]

His children are 1 and 3.

His password was changed from the default but it was just his name so easy enough to guess.

[Devil2575]

I don't but then my Internet has no download limits.

[Devil2575]

Marcellus said:

delboy735 said:

Opening post..." a neighbour of mine"......the clue may be there somewhere !!!

Ah ok then does the neighbour of the op have a cloud back up?

No idea but I doubt it.

[Devil2575]

Retroman said:

I've worked for a few ISP's myself and every time someone has reported they never used x amount of data, on investigation they always had.

I know the bloke reasonably well and he's not the kind of person to try and get out of paying what he owes.

What concerned me a little about the story was that his wife (and mine for that matter) seemed to have jumped to the conclusion that it must be the new neighbours "Who are obviously dodgy" when I suspected that there was no way they could easily determine this to be the case.

[Devil2575]

Retroman said:

If your neighbour is tech savvy...

I doubt he is.

[Devil2575]

Retroman said:

jesta1865 said:

surely if he is liable, he is entitled to know what has been streamed using his wifi? IANAL but that doesn't seem right to me.

it's like people who phone the house number then don't want to tell me who they are working for as I'm not the person who the call is for. My house, my phone line, I think I can expect to find out the name of the company using it, how is that breaking the DPA that they try and hide behind?

If they expect him to pay they should give him the details.

As per my post, it's not always possible to see exactly what people are doing with their connection.
Most ISPs will only be able to view how much data was used in a period but aren't able to break it down to what specifically was used (e.g 1GB on Youtube, 200mb on emails)

They will have a counter showing the OPs neighbour has over used and that's all they need.

Don't ISPs store data on what you are looking at on the internet?
I always thought they did.

[Devil2575]

Just thought i'd update this topic.

I was out drinking with my Neighbour and Saturday night so got the story first hand and how it was resolved.

He suspected his new neighbours because the additional data usage started the day after they moved in and stopped the same day they had a broadband connection installed. By additional I mean data usage that was happening late in the evening/early hours after he had gone to bed. His use of the internet is limited and he isn't connected to the cloud or have apps that update.

Anyway he simply went round and had a chat with the lady next door and suggested that she might want to talk to her son. A few days later the son came round with £40 and an appology, apparently thankful that he had been dealt with so reasonably as where he used to live he would have been thumped.

So, all it took was a few words. Who knew life was so simple