AT&T has lost a court case to 39-year-old Matt Spaccarelli, over smartphone data throttling.
Spaccarelli is an iPhone owner who has AT&T's grandfathered unlimited data plan. In 2010, the carrier discontinued the plan and moved to tiered pricing. In 2011, the carrier began to throttle heavy data users down from 3G to 2G. Spaccarelli says his device began to see the slow speeds after just 1.5GB of data used in a billing cycle by early 2012.
In his interview, Spaccarelli showed off horrendous 0.31 Mbps speed in California, down from the nationwide average of 1.7 Mbps. The iPhone owner claimed that due to AT&T's actions, he cannot stream video or even browse the Web without complications.
Judge Russell Nadel of small claims court has ruled this week that AT&T violated the terms of the unlimited data plan and must pay $850, "an estimation of the data usage over the remainder of Spaccarelli's contract, plus $85 for court costs."
The elated iPhone owner says he will use the money to get a new smartphone on a better carrier and also travel to the AT&T stockholders meeting in April.
In his interview, Spaccarelli showed off horrendous 0.31 Mbps speed in California, down from the nationwide average of 1.7 Mbps. The iPhone owner claimed that due to AT&T's actions, he cannot stream video or even browse the Web without complications.
Judge Russell Nadel of small claims court has ruled this week that AT&T violated the terms of the unlimited data plan and must pay $850, "an estimation of the data usage over the remainder of Spaccarelli's contract, plus $85 for court costs."
The elated iPhone owner says he will use the money to get a new smartphone on a better carrier and also travel to the AT&T stockholders meeting in April.
