Man beats AT&T with Iphone throttling claim

AN UNEMPLOYED truck driver and student who took on telecommunications giant AT&T when it started throttling the data service on his Iphone has won.

Matt Spaccarelli was not happy when he discovered that the "unlimited" service he had with AT&T would be more accurately described as "limited", and took the firm to a small claims court.

There, reports the Associated Press, he argued that it was not fair for the company to promise him unlimited service and then slow that service down. Common sense and Judge Russell Nadel agreed, and Spaccarelli won $850 for his trouble.

"I need the money, but for me, this case is not about money at all," said Spaccarelli. "You don't tell somebody 'you have unlimited' and then cut them off."

For an individual $850 is not an insignificant amount, but for AT&T, a very large communications firm, it is pocket change.

AT&T does have around 17 million customers on "unlimited data plans", according to the AP, however, which suggests that it could face more claims like this.

Spaccarelli did not exactly stick to the terms of his contract, however, and had tethered his Ipad to the AT&T data deal. The judge awarded him $85 for each of the remaining ten months of his contract, as this is the charge he would have received had he burst into a 3GB data allowance. µ