AT&T WiFi hotspots free to iPhone owners, anyone with a brain

Now that AT&T has full control of wireless hotspots like Starbucks and Barnes and Nobles, it looks like they're doling out freebies to their favorite customers: iPhone users. Apparently, if you've got one of Apple's devices, you can hop on the WiFi networks for exactly zero dollars provided you enter your phone number at a login screen. Great for iPhone owners, but a raw deal for everyone else, right? Not so fast, apparently a dumb hack gets you the service on the house too -- just switch your browser's user agent to Mobile Safari, and presto! Free internet. We can't imagine this is a hole that won't get plugged real fast, so get it while the gettin's good.

[Via TUAW]

Read - AT&T Providing Free Wi-Fi Access to iPhone Users
Read - Hotspot hack

[kirsch Posted May 1st 2008 11:59AM]

Of course they could keep track of your iPhone's MAC address as well and compare that to the phone number you entered.
Sure that's spoofable too, but it's an extra step to do it.

[modrak Posted May 1st 2008 12:03PM]

wow, what a hack. so you switch your user agent to mobile safari and then enter your phone number which is the iPhone registered to! Genius!!!

what if you don't have an iPhone contract ?

[WixosTrix Posted May 1st 2008 12:08PM]

That's so BS! As much money as I pay AT&T for unlimited internet on my Tilt, plus all the other services charges, people like me should get free WiFi too. So not fair *pouts*

[Slarity Posted May 1st 2008 12:16PM]

I totally agree, if you pay for unlimited internet give em wifi!!

Im going to test this out on my iPhone at McDonalds today =)

[(Unverified) Posted May 1st 2008 12:11PM]

I have an unlocked iPhone on T-mobile network, so when I went to a starbucks, i figured i'd use my uverse login (as we get free att hotspot), but my iphone immediately is recognized through my browser, and it asks me for me iPhone ATT number, but I have Tmobile, and I couldnt find a way to view the "regular" website so I could navigate to the option of using a separate method.

[(Unverified) Posted May 1st 2008 2:39PM]

how do u switch r user agent on the iPhone?

[psyclotron Posted May 1st 2008 2:41PM]

why would you need to?

[Timerider Posted May 1st 2008 12:34PM]

Can you use an iPod touch? If so, do you still need a phone number?

[(Unverified) Posted May 1st 2008 1:00PM]

I dont have a iphone contract. How do i change the agent?

[psyclotron Posted May 1st 2008 1:43PM]

Try really hard

[TRAFFICBLOWS Posted May 1st 2008 1:05PM]

What if you put in your friend's iPhone number?

[psyclotron Posted May 1st 2008 1:42PM]

What if he's got a pointed stick?

[(Unverified) Posted May 1st 2008 1:11PM]

This is just Perfect.
This happens just one day after I signed up for their Wi-Fi $19.99 plan!!!
I should've known to just wait...

[LazarusLong Posted May 1st 2008 1:13PM]

This all seems overly complicated to get WiFi access. Why not just go to one of the many of hundreds of other locations that offer FREE WiFi ?? I know most of the McDonald's restaurants I go to offer free WiFi access. Plus many of the smaller, locally owned restaurants, cafes, bars, etc. I visit now offer free access.

Plus you don't have to pay for overpriced coffee ?

[psyclotron Posted May 1st 2008 1:52PM]

because sometimes we don't want to sit in a lard stained plastic booth

[jeicrash Posted May 1st 2008 1:43PM]

Why not just spoof the mac on your laptop to look like an iphone wifi-card, then set your useragent, and provide whatever idiotic info they want?

Or just use wifi from the dozens of other places that is free to anyone.

Just MHO. Paying for hotspot/wifi access is like paying for water, with all the people offering it, you can always find it free elsewhere.

[nikg Posted May 1st 2008 1:50PM]

But even if they do block it, can't we all just use the SDK with the built-in iphone emulator? It's running v 2.0, and it does support apps..

[ZeroCorpse Posted May 1st 2008 2:37PM]

I was told by AT&T that the free WiFi hotspots are for ANYONE who uses AT&T High Speed Internet services. I get my DSL from them, so I can use my MacBook at Starbucks without paying for it.

Of course, I never go to Starbucks. Bigby's coffee is better, and their WiFi is free to anyone.

[THJ Posted May 1st 2008 3:12PM]

Only thing I can think of for them to lock it up (ie, keep out non-iphone users) would be for them to send a PIN code to your iphone. Probably more trouble than it's worth on their end though.

[(Unverified) Posted May 1st 2008 4:12PM]

I used both my iPhone and my Macbook using the Mobile Safari trick to access the Park Row sbux wifi here in NYC. Worked like a charm. Instruction on how can be found here.

http://funkdigital.wordpress.com/2008/05/01/use-atts-starbucks-wifi-for-free-iphone-hacks/

[(Unverified) Posted May 1st 2008 4:21PM]

Windows Mobile, Symbian OS, and Palm OS users:

1) Download NetFront Browser or any other mobile browser which allows you to change the User-Agent. Opera Mini, Opera Mobile, and PIE do not allow you to, so I strongly recommend using NetFront - it's also pretty functional (better than Opera Mobile, worse than Opera Mini).

Link: (Windows Mobile version) http://www.access-company.com/products/mobile_solutions/netfrontmobile/browser/35_wm_tp.html

2) Install it. Start it up. Menu -> Tools -> Browser Settings ->Network ->

3) Simply add a new user-agent profile with the following info.:

Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; U; CPU like Mac OS X; en) AppleWebKit/420+ (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/3.0 Mobile/1A543a Safari/419.3

4) Test it out and let me know if it works.

[victorstuber Posted May 1st 2008 4:33PM]

test

[psyclotron Posted May 1st 2008 4:40PM]

we receive you loud and fail

[victorstuber Posted May 1st 2008 4:58PM]

phanbouy i hate you so much

[psyclotron Posted May 1st 2008 5:02PM]

haha, get a life. and a shrink.

[victorstuber Posted May 1st 2008 5:06PM]

oh its on

[(Unverified) Posted May 1st 2008 7:40PM]

I left AT&T back in January this year (2008) and worked directly with the iPhone WiFi authentication project. When I left, the WiFi authentication was setup as follows:

AT&T Broadband and UVerse Customers with 3 meg service or higher would be able to authenticate to the AT&T WiFi HotSpots using their Broadband username and password. This was done via a RADIUS profile for these customers which allows WiFi authentication.

Since January I have left AT&T and also purchased an iPhone. As I no longer have AT&T (BellSouth) Broadband, I am not aware of any way to authenticate to a WiFi hotspot using my AT&T Wireless credentials.

[(Unverified) Posted May 7th 2008 9:20AM]

Hello. How do you get this AT&T WiFi hotspots on your iphone for free?
Thanks

[(Unverified) Posted May 8th 2008 4:52PM]

Does it just pop up once you reach a hotspot or do you have to enter a certain URL address?

[(Unverified) Posted May 11th 2008 1:24AM]

look i just got an iphone but i have a question if i use the wirless of my neighbers house does still at & t charge me ?