Help International Text messages because of aGPS?

[tgarcia]

I have had the same problem and it does not have to do with a sloppy international developer. I spoke to a sprint customer service rep from the fraud department and he said that i was texting local numbers, local to my home, from other countries. So the Samsung Moment GPS is faulty and he knows there is an issue because it shows me as texting a local number from India and Singapore in the same day, within hours!!!

I was told to go to a sprint store and see what they can do. I know there is nothing they can do right now until there is a patch available. Now that there are billing issues I am certain Sprint will get a patch out soon.

 

[tgarcia]

To test the issue, those who have not seen the problem should turn off gps and enable Use wireless networks. Then open Google maps and if it shows you as being in a different country, send a text message to a number local to your home and you will probably get hit with an international text charge...

Sometimes Google maps will show that your phone is in a different location but its still in the US so if that is the case there will be no international charge.

 

[dkjones96]

My 'Use Wireless Networks' selection has been on since day one. I work and live in tin-roof buildings so gps hardly ever works for me.

The user data header for an SMS message barely has enough room for the recipient's and sender's phone number so I don't see how they could fit GPS coordinates or anything like that in it for the international texting.

tgarcia, can you provide a phone number for the department you talked to and explain what you said to them to get the texting info released? You are the first user so far that I've read actually got information from sprint regarding where the messages were going.

 

[tgarcia]

I dont have the phone number, as I was redirected from the regular 611 customer service call. I've been trying to make my phone think I am in a different place but I am not having any luck.

I'm not sure what combination will cause the phone to think it is in a different location.

 

[numus]

This makes no sense since text messages are sent via the voice stream and not the data stream.. If this held true because of the GPS, the same would apply to voice calls and it would show you making international phone calls.. I think the person at sprint didn't really know what they were talking about...

 

[tgarcia]

dkjones96,
I dont think the sms has any location data in the actual message. Perhaps sprints gets information from the phone, which tells where the phone's last location is when it sent the message.

I'm not sure, all i know is the customer service rep asked me if I was out of the country or on a cruise ship. I guess if your on a cruise ship you may be able to be in a few different regions within a short period of time. I dont know how fast cruise ships go... ;-)

The first thing I asked the rep was, are these messages I sent to other countries or are they messages I received. He said they are messages I sent from other counties to common local numbers where I live. He said it does seem weird that I was in several different regions.

 

[AndroidSPCS]

I have had the same problem and it does not have to do with a sloppy international developer. I spoke to a sprint customer service rep from the fraud department and he said that i was texting local numbers, local to my home, from other countries. So the Samsung Moment GPS is faulty and he knows there is an issue because it shows me as texting a local number from India and Singapore in the same day, within hours!!!

I was told to go to a sprint store and see what they can do. I know there is nothing they can do right now until there is a patch available. Now that there are billing issues I am certain Sprint will get a patch out soon.

LOL never confuse a fraud guy with someone who actually understands how the technology works.

As explained over and over above, no way can a faulty GPS location cause texts to be charged from some fake location. The text stream is different from the GPS streams of data, for different purposes.

 

[numus]

LOL never confuse a fraud guy with someone who actually understands how the technology works.

As explained over and over above, no way can a faulty GPS location cause texts to be charged from some fake location. The text stream is different from the GPS streams of data, for different purposes.

Just remember SMS's have existed long before GPS chips were put into phones

 

[colettak]

So, I was having this same problem on my moment and I seem to have figured out the problem and a solution, hopefully.

The problem is with your contacts. Check them -- I'd be willing to bet some of them have a +1 in front of them. It's the international format, and google sometimes asks if you want to automatically convert phone numbers into this format.

Now, on the moment, if you go into settings you will see something called "Plus Code Dialing". It is supposed to replace the + code "as needed" for outgoing calls, but I believe it to be faulty. After talking with sprint people for a looooooooong while, they told me whenever I texted my girflriend's number (who lives with me locally), it was an international text.

So, what's happening is that for some unknown reason, the phone thinks that it needs to convert a + at the front of a phone number into the international calling code 011. This makes it an international text.

I must say though, this shouldn't happen. Clearly it doesn't charge for international calls, so it's either laziness on Sprint's part or a bug in the phone, or both.

I'm not sure this is the issue, but based on the information I had it was the only thing that seemed possible. Please let me know if you guys see a similar thing.

P.S. I'd also like to point out that problems with aGPS could be an issue -- aGPS uses the cell towers to triangulate position, so if it does that wrong, it could clearly be tricked into thinking it needs to append an international code. I'm not saying at all that this is the case, but it COULD happen. Everyone was saying gps has nothing to do with it, but aGPS, since it uses the towers, definitely could.

 

[jeffdlb]

The problem is with your contacts. Check them -- I'd be willing to bet some of them have a +1 in front of them. It's the international format, and google sometimes asks if you want to automatically convert phone numbers into this format.

Now, on the moment, if you go into settings you will see something called "Plus Code Dialing". It is supposed to replace the + code "as needed" for outgoing calls, but I believe it to be faulty.

This sounds like a very plausible explanation. I hope they fix this before I get my Moment, because almost all of my numbers have the +1 in front. I may have to do a bulk edit before import. (The supposed advantage of using that standard format is that the phone should thereby be able to automatically apply calling prefixes for long-distance local calls.)

 

[numus]

With gmail integration it is incredibly easy to edit phone numbers.. All you do is log into gmail and go into your contacts and just edit them from the convience of your computer (it is actually easy and doesn't take that long)... Much easier then editing them in outlook or on the phone itself

So, I was having this same problem on my moment and I seem to have figured out the problem and a solution, hopefully.

The problem is with your contacts. Check them -- I'd be willing to bet some of them have a +1 in front of them. It's the international format, and google sometimes asks if you want to automatically convert phone numbers into this format.

Now, on the moment, if you go into settings you will see something called "Plus Code Dialing". It is supposed to replace the + code "as needed" for outgoing calls, but I believe it to be faulty. After talking with sprint people for a looooooooong while, they told me whenever I texted my girflriend's number (who lives with me locally), it was an international text.

So, what's happening is that for some unknown reason, the phone thinks that it needs to convert a + at the front of a phone number into the international calling code 011. This makes it an international text.

I must say though, this shouldn't happen. Clearly it doesn't charge for international calls, so it's either laziness on Sprint's part or a bug in the phone, or both.

I'm not sure this is the issue, but based on the information I had it was the only thing that seemed possible. Please let me know if you guys see a similar thing.

P.S. I'd also like to point out that problems with aGPS could be an issue -- aGPS uses the cell towers to triangulate position, so if it does that wrong, it could clearly be tricked into thinking it needs to append an international code. I'm not saying at all that this is the case, but it COULD happen. Everyone was saying gps has nothing to do with it, but aGPS, since it uses the towers, definitely could.

Plus code dialing is very possible... once again, cell tower triangulation.. not that plasuable due to how SMS messages work (they DO NOT use the EVDO data, they use the same carrier signal that voice is transmitted on (hense why when data cuts off during a call you can still recieve sms messages)

 

[colettak]

By cell tower triangulation problem, I mean the phone may use that to initially determine whether or not to do the plus code dialing. It does seem unlikely though, I agree.

 

[numus]

By cell tower triangulation problem, I mean the phone may use that to initially determine whether or not to do the plus code dialing. It does seem unlikely though, I agree.

No.. The phone gets the correct information from the cell tower (or else it would be in violation of e911 standards)..
The problem isn't the phone getting the information from the cell tower (it gets this perfectly fine) the problem is the way the location software (specific to consumer end programs only) intreprets the data and displays it as a location.. This is software side on the phone for consumer level location, not cell side...
the SMS text is actual transmitted through the voice stream via 1xRTT.. if the issue was this determining to put the plus sign on it (or even to determine if you should route the sms through international carriers) then it would do the exact same thing via Phone Calls... The difference is the software might know to leave the + off, but the sms code was never amended with this check (remember android 1.5 was coded for GSM only.. CDMA implementation was hacked into it and didn't gain native support until 1.6.. so it is more likely samsung forgot to amend the sms protocal the same way they did the call protocal)

 

[SlyFerret]

The automatic +code dialing is a possibility. So far, it's the most plausible explanation, and it could actually have something to do with the aGPS.

If adding +code dialing to an SMS causes it to be billed by sprint as international... it sounds like there might be a network side bug in Sprint's SMS system.

It's possible that this bug never came up until a device (lucky us) started trying to do +code dialing automatically based on inaccurate GPS location information.

Certainly something to look into. I suppose we could test it by manually sending an SMS to a local number using +code dialing.

-SF

 

[numus]

I give up trying to explain how sms works..

 

[SlyFerret]

haha!

I know how SMS works, which is why I've been saying that the GPS location has nothing to do with the SMS stack.

I'd be curious to know if sending a domestic SMS form a moment (or any sprint device for that matter) using the full +code version in the number would result in Sprint trying to bill it as an international SMS.

-SF

 

[numus]

haha!

I know how SMS works, which is why I've been saying that the GPS location has nothing to do with the SMS stack.

I'd be curious to know if sending a domestic SMS form a moment (or any sprint device for that matter) using the full +code version in the number would result in Sprint trying to bill it as an international SMS.

-SF

More then likely it is a glitch leftover from when samsung attempted to convert the GSM code into CDMA.. remember the moment isn't a world phone (i don't even believe it could work in canada even tho they have a CDMA network established up there) so there would be no reason to have the phone automatically augment world code information... Trust me.. my phone has said i am in Sudan multiple times while sending text messages and i have yet to get an international charge.. More then likely the + got ported over when you had the phonebook exported from your old device (whatever you had before this) and never took it off.. there is probably a world code check in the cdma code that tells the phone not to dial +1 world codes (due to teh fact it is highly redundent) but samsung probably failed to ensure this check existed in the SMS code (believe me, samsung forgot A LOT of stuff in the GSM->CDMA conversion.. the code is horribly sloppy and a headache to read)... It is incredibly likely it has nothing to do with the area reporting and has everything to do with the number is stored WITH the worldcode...

Easiest way is to simply look at your contacts in gmail (if you have gmail sync active) and see how the number is listed in your contacts...

I have Plus Code Dialing enabled and have yet to get any such charge..

 

[SlyFerret]

I haven't been charged yet either.

I'm still waiting for somebody who has been charged to get the information from Sprint as to what number they were supposedly texting that got billed as international.

I still think that it is also possible that some app is trying to "phone home" via SMS, but without knowing what number the SMS was sent to, there's no way to determine if the SMS in question is one that the user actually sent on purpose. I don't want to jump to that conclusion until we know what number the SMS is being sent to.

-SF

 

[colettak]

As I said, I was billed for dialing a 919 number (which is a local number to me). I did have the +1 in front of the number, and the phone was automatically converting it to a 001 because of the "plus code dialing."

My point is even if you have the +1, the phone should be smart enough not to make it international if it doesn't need to be -- that is the intended design, anyway.

The two solutions are:

1) Turn off plus code dialing

or

2) Remove the preceding +1's from all your contact numbers.

The thing that is annoying is when I was typing in my contacts into google, it asked me if I wanted to let them automatically convert it to international phone format. Little did I know it would cause me to get charged for international texts.

 

[numus]

As I said, I was billed for dialing a 919 number (which is a local number to me). I did have the +1 in front of the number, and the phone was automatically converting it to a 001 because of the "plus code dialing."

My point is even if you have the +1, the phone should be smart enough not to make it international if it doesn't need to be -- that is the intended design, anyway.

The two solutions are:

1) Turn off plus code dialing

or

2) Remove the preceding +1's from all your contact numbers.

The thing that is annoying is when I was typing in my contacts into google, it asked me if I wanted to let them automatically convert it to international phone format. Little did I know it would cause me to get charged for international texts.

Once again.. more then likely this is because samsung forgot to port the conversion code to the moment...

Going to repeat it 1 more time... ANDROID 1.5 CUPCAKE IS NOT FOR CDMA!!!!!
It is for GSM Native thus ALL CDMA CODE was ported onto it... This means they might have missed somethings (and they missed a lot of things FYI)

COMPLAIN TO SAMSUNG NOT SPRINT... Sprint can't do a damn thing about it... all they can do is relay the message to samsung who has been downstairs in a sound proof bunker not letting us know what they are up to

"My point is even if you have the +1, the phone should be smart enough not to make it international if it doesn't need to be -- that is the intended design, anyway. "
Yes.. the phone is SUPPOSE to do this, but samsung screwed up and forgot to implement it it appears..

 

[SlyFerret]

At least we know what's going on now!

-SF

 

[betafan]

An interesting theory. I was billed(later credited) for making/receiving intl texts on my december bill. Had 37 last month, and 20 so far this month. I'm not sure if I buy the plus code dialing, and here's why: only 4 or 5 of my contacts had the 1 in front of their number(synced through Google Contacts). One of those contacts with a one+ number, I have exchanged around 150 texts since I installed handcent(late november). If the 1 preceding the area code were to blame, I would expect many more intl text charges. At any rate, I went through all my contacts and deleted the "1's". I'll report back if I keep getting charged for intl texts.

For Sprint's part, the reps at the store had not heard of the issue, but credited me back no problem(actually, a couple extra bucks just for padding). They said I'll just have to come in or call CS until this problem is resolved. Fun stuff!!

Update: 1/13/10 No new intl text charges showing since I removed the '1' preceding my contacts. I'm beginning to believe.

 

[Othan1]

I get international SMS whenever I go into down town San Diego. We're so close to the Mexican border I get Sprint's automated "Welcome to Sprint Mexico" messages and then switches my google to Spanish. heh. Kinda funny, but good to know I'll have signal if I ever decide to leave the country.

 

[wilochka]

I just got my bill and had one international text to Russia.

I blew it off, but mentioned it when I was calling Sprint for something else. I then googled it and found this post. I called them, they credited my account, but I insisted on more. They told me they cannot block international texts, but they can only block the number. I never received or sent any texts to Russia!

They credited my account and transferred me to tech support. Tech support found the charge but said it was incoming, so she couldn't give me a number. I asked why I was charged for incoming messages, and she said that's just the way it is. I told her I would definitely be calling back if I get any more.

So, if I received a text message from a russian phone number, but it never showed up in my inbox, I assume this means an application intercepted it. I'm very unhappy about this. Are there any logs I can look up to see what exactly these phones are doing? with or without root access?

 

[AdamR]

I work in SWW. Texting a US number from anywhere in the world is based on your texting plan.
The only way you would get charged is if you dialed the access and country code for another country.
I don't doubt this is a billing issue, but its not from AGPS.
Also, why in the hell have you guys not turned off "use wireless network" in the location options?