Hasta La Gadget!

If you’re been using your Android phone as a Wi-Fi hotspot without telling T-Mobile, Verizon Wireless, or AT&T about it and paying for their tethering plans, all three companies are out to get you. That shouldn’t be a surprise, since AT&T has been keeping an eye on users with unusual data usage and forcing them to upgrade to tethering-supported plans. Now they’re all taking the extra step to block the myriad of wireless tethering apps available in the Android Market entirely. 

The most popular app in this category, Wireless Tether, is free in the Android Market but requires users have their phones rooted in order to work. The trouble now is that users with Android devices on AT&T, T-Mobile, and Verizon Wireless won’t be able to find the app, since it just won’t be listed in the Android market when they search for it. The same is true for apps like PDANet, Tether for Android, and Easy Tether.

That won’t stop most people – you can still grab the APKs for each app from a number of other sources, the least of which are usually the developers’ own Web sites, but the carriers are trying as much as they can to make the process inconvenient for users. If this pattern of behavior continues, expect to see the battle between carriers and users who tether their phones without authorization from their carriers to escalate. 

[via Operation Android]