[HN Gopher] FCC fines largest wireless carriers for sharing loca...
       ___________________________________________________________________
        
       FCC fines largest wireless carriers for sharing location data
        
       Author : coloneltcb
       Score  : 266 points
       Date   : 2024-04-29 19:14 UTC (3 hours ago)
        
 (HTM) web link (docs.fcc.gov)
 (TXT) w3m dump (docs.fcc.gov)
        
       | xchip wrote:
       | How much is the cost per user? Maybe it is not that much in the
       | end (as usual)
        
         | kstrauser wrote:
         | The total fine seems to be $200M, so maybe a buck a person.
         | That's still a whole lot more than their previous fine of $0.00
         | for it. Now we have a precedent.
        
           | jazzyjackson wrote:
           | A precedent that selling out your users gets you a slap on
           | the wrist
        
             | kstrauser wrote:
             | Alternatively, a precedent that the FCC can and will
             | actually fine someone for breaking the law. The leap from
             | $0 to $200M is much larger than the step from $200M to real
             | fines.
        
           | beretguy wrote:
           | So, we improved from fining $0 to $1.
        
             | kstrauser wrote:
             | Correct, and imagine the amount of work it took to make
             | that possible at all. If you build a car factory, you're
             | not going to make a whole lot of net profit off the first
             | one you sell. It's way easier to make car #2 after you have
             | everything in place to make car #1. Given the size and
             | complexity of the organizations involved in this fine, that
             | may actually be a reasonable analogy. I'd bet person-years
             | of work went into making it happen, and that a lot of that
             | could be dusted off and re-used if the FCC wanted to do it
             | again.
        
           | thfuran wrote:
           | >That's still a whole lot more than their previous fine of
           | $0.00
           | 
           | No, it's barely more.
        
       | kstrauser wrote:
       | Right on! I'm happy to see the FCC on a roll lately. Keep it up!
        
       | rattlesnakedave wrote:
       | > Sprint and T-Mobile - which have merged since the investigation
       | began - face fines of more than $12 million and $80 million,
       | respectively. AT&T is fined more than $57 million, and Verizon is
       | fined almost $47 million
       | 
       | This seems fundamentally unserious. To scope it, Verizon's gross
       | profit for the twelve months ending December 31, 2023 was
       | $79.087B.
        
         | 1024core wrote:
         | They'll just write it off as cost of doing business.
         | 
         | Increase the fines by 2 orders of magnitude, that will get
         | their attention.
        
           | jjtheblunt wrote:
           | You mean 100x?
           | 
           | (Still might be ignorable)
        
             | Rebelgecko wrote:
             | That would decrease their EPS by like 50%, investors would
             | probably care which means the company wouldn't ignore it
             | IMO
        
               | jjtheblunt wrote:
               | would be hard to consider it an operating expense for
               | sure
        
       | jahrichie wrote:
       | Did they ever fine anyone over AT&T letting NSA tap into all
       | decrypted network data, cause that seems a lot more egregious
       | lol.
       | 
       | https://techcrunch.com/2018/06/25/nsa-att-intercept-surveill...
        
         | wmf wrote:
         | Just forward the bill to the NSA...
        
         | themaninthedark wrote:
         | No, for that there was bi-partisan support for retroactive
         | immunity....
        
         | WalterBright wrote:
         | The NSA could be self-funding if they simply charged people for
         | the restoration of backups they made of everyones' drives.
        
       | uptown wrote:
       | Sprint - $12 million fine (In 2019, Sprint Corporation's revenue
       | amounted to 33.6 billion U.S. dollars)
       | 
       | T-Mobile - $80 million fine (T-Mobile US annual revenue for 2021
       | was $80.118B)
       | 
       | AT&T - $57 million fine (AT&T revenue for the twelve months
       | ending March 31, 2024 was $122.317B)
       | 
       | Verizon - $47 million fine (Verizon annual revenue for 2023 was
       | $133.974B)
        
         | ado__dev wrote:
         | Just the cost of doing business.
        
         | tithe wrote:
         | Sprint - 0.0003 of revenue
         | 
         | T-Mobile - 0.0009 of revenue
         | 
         | AT&T - 0.0004 of revenue
         | 
         | Verizon - 0.0003 of revenue
        
           | beretguy wrote:
           | That's like fining me $1 if I did my math right.
        
           | pahkah wrote:
           | I appreciate the point, but the numbers there are the
           | proportion of revenue, not the percentage of revenue, so
           | they're off by a factor of 100.
        
             | tithe wrote:
             | You're absolutely right; updated!
        
           | newsclues wrote:
           | Makes a speeding ticket for someone making minimum wage look
           | expensive
        
             | barbariangrunge wrote:
             | Look expensive? It means not eating
        
           | gruez wrote:
           | Seems like a weird comparison to make considering the money
           | they made selling the data is only a small fraction of their
           | overall revenue.
        
           | JumpCrisscross wrote:
           | The relevant denominator is the revenue from these data
           | sales.
        
         | Vvector wrote:
         | Welcome to the new charge on my bill:
         | 
         | $2.00 FCC Fine Recovery Charge
        
       | Rebelgecko wrote:
       | How much does a data broker pay for an individual's location?
        
         | adrr wrote:
         | A few cents. It wasn't that good since it would just give you
         | what cell tower their phone was pinging off of.
        
       | jmward01 wrote:
       | The core issue is transparency. I don't want to see a 'privacy
       | policy', I want to see who a company has sold/given my
       | information to and what limitations that sale has. The concept is
       | simple. If you collect anything about me and allow some other
       | entity access, you tell me about it/make it easy for me to see
       | -and- block. Most of this abuse of personal data would go away if
       | people knew it was going on.
        
         | sofixa wrote:
         | > Most of this abuse of personal data would go away if people
         | knew it was going on.
         | 
         | GDPR proves this wrong. Most people click OK/accept even in
         | front of relatively clear information (to be fair sometimes the
         | options are "accept for you to be tracked and shared with 'our
         | partners' or pay a subscription/fee", which is an easy choice
         | for many.
        
           | spinningD20 wrote:
           | Yet if the business model / customer's _existing_ service
           | agreement is changed, the temperature of the water that the
           | frog is in just went up a little bit, so folks continue using
           | it, which is what often happens as well.
           | 
           | "well, I'm not sure if they're going to start collecting or
           | using my data, because I don't actually really KNOW that or
           | the extent of everything, just an email from them with a
           | vague update to an equally vague privacy policy that I
           | apparently implicitly agree to if I don't discontinue using
           | their service."
           | 
           | Just like a manufacturer/seller on say, amazon shouldn't be
           | able to revise their product with cheaper quality under the
           | same model number (and yet it happens all the time), changes
           | to the agreement of a service should be treated as a new
           | service.
           | 
           | Whatever the solution, it should be a big enough deal that it
           | cannot be implicitly agreed to, and clear enough language
           | (maybe vetted by a third party review of the agreement) to
           | communicate to all users, what is at stake and how, to which
           | third parties, etc.
        
           | 38 wrote:
           | This is misleading. The OK is almost universally made easier
           | to click through dark patterns, with the "reject" being
           | hidden or taking more clicks
        
             | cogman10 wrote:
             | Yup. At least 2 clicks and you have to process what you are
             | clicking to understand. I've seen more than a few sites
             | where it's
             | 
             | "Ok" then "Customize" followed by a bunch of checkboxes to
             | disable cookies while the "accept all button" is where
             | typically "OK" would be and the "reject all" is often
             | labeled something else that isn't clear.
             | 
             | This is also not often remembered on future visits so you
             | end up doing this dance every time you visit that site.
        
             | ikiris wrote:
             | And those are illegal under gdpr, and enforcement is slow
             | but happening. Whats your point?
        
           | hocuspocus wrote:
           | In this very case, the GDPR is scary enough that European
           | carriers make sure to anonymize and aggregate analytics they
           | sell to third parties. Even if you click OK, a data leak
           | would be pretty harmless and wouldn't identify you
           | personally.
        
             | sroussey wrote:
             | Location data that includes your home in the suburbs is
             | pretty identifiable.
        
               | hocuspocus wrote:
               | Carrier position accuracy is pretty shit in low density
               | areas, you aggregate (e.g. per H3 tile), apply scaling
               | (no operator has 100% market share) and K-anonymity.
        
           | onli wrote:
           | Many people click no whenever there is not a manipulated
           | choice. See https://www.cnil.fr/en/evolution-practices-web-
           | regarding-coo...
           | 
           | "Most" may be correct, but given how annoying those banners
           | are I would not read too much into that.
        
         | techdmn wrote:
         | AND if people had viable alternatives. (Sorry, I see now that
         | you mentioned blocking, which would also work.)
        
         | idatum wrote:
         | Everything should be opt-in. Burden should be on them,
         | something like, "We want to share your data and if you agree
         | here are the benefits to you."
        
           | krustyburger wrote:
           | "We want to share your data and if you agree here are the
           | benefits to our shareholders."
        
           | ethbr1 wrote:
           | That's something I think the EU got right -- being hard-nosed
           | about true tracking consent requiring a user to receive the
           | same outcome regardless of their choice.
           | 
           | Anything shy is begging companies to dark-engineer patterns
           | around obtaining it.
        
             | nox101 wrote:
             | The EU didn't get this right - or else they aren't
             | enforcing it. I'm in the EU right now and the crap I see is
             | a popup "We respect your privacy. Us and 352 (not an
             | exaggeration!) of our partners are collecting data on you.
             | Approve or Details?" Pick details and you can spend your
             | time going through the partners
             | 
             | https://pasteboard.co/rrL2bpmiE6Zq.png
             | 
             | And most you can't reject
             | 
             | Even more hilarious. pageboard itself said 847 partners!
             | 
             | https://pasteboard.co/XQHhPzTw42Pv.png
        
           | calvinmorrison wrote:
           | if this is the case, it really needs to MATERIALLY benefit
           | you. My friend uses all the rewards apps and really uses
           | credit card points, programmes, etc, and it does benefit
           | them.
           | 
           | Me? I just use cash everywhere and now the guy at harbor
           | freight knows I'm the guy who says 'I dont have a cell phone
           | number'.
           | 
           | Contracts you know, they need to benefit both sides.
        
           | grobbyy wrote:
           | I have mixed feelings about opt in. A single accidental click
           | on a web site and GDPR has failed to protect the user. Dark
           | patterns allow that to be gamed. And it complicates
           | legitimate uses.
           | 
           | I'd like auditable data. I should have an easy way to
           | discover everyone with my data (including things like IP
           | logs), see how it's used (at the level of source), and have
           | it destroyed.
        
           | notfed wrote:
           | Why would anyone opt-in to having their location sold? Some
           | things should just be banned.
        
         | barbariangrunge wrote:
         | The core issue isn't transparency. It's surveillance and
         | powerlessness
        
         | gmd63 wrote:
         | I would extend this to include companies like Facebook that
         | study your data to derive deeper insights about you. I want to
         | be entitled to every conclusion they reach about me from my own
         | data, so I can correct whatever assumptions they have about me
         | and possibly learn more about myself.
        
       | moshun wrote:
       | This was not a fine. It was a below the line operating cost.
        
         | bluGill wrote:
         | It was a first time warning. If they don't reform they can get
         | hit with repeated fines that are larger.
        
           | tgsovlerkhgsel wrote:
           | Fining them after several years of the bad behavior doesn't
           | un-share the data, which means even the "first time warning"
           | should be painful enough so that they don't chance it next
           | time.
           | 
           | If the fines are cheap, companies have every motivation to
           | try and see if they get away with shady or even knowingly
           | illegal behavior - if not, the fine won't hurt too much and
           | if yes, free profit.
           | 
           | If the fines hurt even the first time, there's a much bigger
           | motivation to actually comply with the law from the start.
        
             | toomuchtodo wrote:
             | Call your Congressperson.
             | 
             | "Hi, my name is ___. I am asking you to support and, if
             | possible, co-sponsor the American Privacy Rights Act of
             | 2024. My zip code for constituent survey purposes is ___."
             | 
             | https://www.congress.gov/members/find-your-member
             | 
             | https://www.commerce.senate.gov/2024/4/committee-chairs-
             | cant...
             | 
             | https://www.commerce.senate.gov/services/files/3F5EEA76-5B1
             | 8...
        
           | throwitaway222 wrote:
           | That was what I was going to say. You can't fine them $8B if
           | the precedent wasn't set yet.
        
       | mulmen wrote:
       | These are civil penalties. What limits (if any) is FCC subject
       | to? Could they have issued larger fines? Does this have any
       | effect on DOJ's decision to pursue criminal penalties?
        
       | mysteria wrote:
       | The bigger question is whether the fine was less than the amount
       | they made selling the location data.
        
         | kronk wrote:
         | I feel that up to a point the fines do little in the grand
         | scheme of things, as they will pass the expense of the fines on
         | to us, the consumer.
        
           | tacocataco wrote:
           | Since Corporations are people, revoke their corporate charter
           | for a couple years while they "do time" to pay for their
           | criminal behavior.
        
             | nhkcode wrote:
             | If they are people, do three strike laws apply to them?
        
           | lupusreal wrote:
           | We need corporal punishment for company executives and
           | members of the board. Cane or flog them Singapore style, then
           | they'll start to pay attention to their company's compliance
           | with the law.
        
         | barbariangrunge wrote:
         | If the fine was more than the income in the past, that still
         | doesn't matter because of the income from future sales will
         | still make this behaviour worthwhile
        
           | gruez wrote:
           | >that still doesn't matter because of the income from future
           | sales will still make this behaviour worthwhile
           | 
           | Wouldn't future sales also be fined?
        
             | barbariangrunge wrote:
             | Depends on how successful their lobbying is in the next
             | decade
        
       | ldjkfkdsjnv wrote:
       | I used to work for a hedge fund that bought data for 125 million
       | americans a month, all of their mobile phone pings. All sorts of
       | deep learning algorithms analyze shopping, warehouse, and other
       | foot traffic. People have no idea the level of understanding some
       | private investors have. It goes far beyond anything you see in
       | public numbers. Some of the smartest people on the planet,
       | teasing out wild facts about daily habits of americans. Every
       | statistical algorithm known to man has been run on this data
        
         | sofixa wrote:
         | > People have no idea the level of understanding some private
         | investors have
         | 
         | Is this to be able to analyse "the market" (how regular humans
         | are consuming)?
        
           | toomuchtodo wrote:
           | Enough so that the Federal Reserve was (and potentially still
           | is) consuming this data.
           | 
           | > Eric Swanson, an economics professor at the University of
           | California, Irvine, said that early in the pandemic, when
           | things were changing quickly, the Fed looked at online rent
           | prices, anonymized cellphone location data and credit card
           | transaction data.
           | 
           | https://www.marketplace.org/2024/03/20/the-fed-loves-a-
           | data-...
        
         | colinsane wrote:
         | how far along are they into correlating different datasets and
         | de-anonymizing? say i buy everything in cash: prepaid SIM, a
         | cellphone without my name in the purchase history, not running
         | anything i didn't compile from source (NixOS on a phone): do
         | you figure my data's useless enough so as to not make it into
         | these datasets? or they're accustomed to correlating so many
         | data points that the cash-only route doesn't accomplish much
         | anymore?
        
           | mperham wrote:
           | They don't care about you or any one individual. They are
           | collecting this data so they can buy/sell shares ahead of the
           | public markets and quarterly reports. Same idea as using
           | satellite photos to determine Walmart parking lot usage.
           | 
           | https://www.npr.org/sections/money/2010/08/19/129298095/with.
           | ..
        
       | issafram wrote:
       | Drop in an ocean. Should've done 5% of annual revenue. That would
       | send a much bigger message.
        
         | sumtechguy wrote:
         | perhaps. but guess who gets to pay that fine? it sure will not
         | be phone companies. it will be in your next bill.
        
           | dotnet00 wrote:
           | That excuse can be used for all violations of regulations,
           | and thus quickly becomes somewhat unreasonable. Particularly
           | since the question being asked is the theoretical of if the
           | prices would not increase by the same percent if the fine was
           | not levied (eg "due to inflation").
        
           | beefok wrote:
           | Hey, that's okay! At least our taxes pay money towards
           | investigating and building these toothless fines! I don't
           | have a problem with the taxes, just that it doesn't do
           | anything.
        
           | lIl-IIIl wrote:
           | They can't increase the prices without customers going to
           | competitors. So it's still an incentive against paying fines.
        
             | cogman10 wrote:
             | These 4 companies are the market. Everyone else (Google Fi,
             | Mint mobile, Boost) are all effectively reselling the
             | product through a carrier agreement.
             | 
             | So, not really any competitors to go to when the entire
             | industry colludes to violate privacy.
        
           | NickC25 wrote:
           | Make the C-Suite and Board personally responsible, and make
           | sure the fine is LARGE. $47 million for Verizon is _nothing_.
           | They profited nearly $80 Billion last year. They spent
           | roughly the same amount for the naming rights to an NBA team
           | 's practice facility back in 2020. They paid Beyonce $30
           | million for a 30 second Super Bowl commercial.
           | 
           | You have to fine the drivers of the corporation's unethical
           | behavior, not the corporation itself, or else there will be
           | no fundamental change or reason for corporations at large to
           | not act with complete disregard for the law.
           | 
           | The shady shit would stop in a heartbeat if some 25-30 people
           | at the top had to collectively come up with a billion+ in
           | cash in a week. No bonds, debt, IOU's from the corporation
           | itself, stocks, mortgages, nothing - straight up cash.
        
         | takeda wrote:
         | It should be set to 10x of all the profits they made from it to
         | create a dilemma for the next time.
        
           | dexterdog wrote:
           | Except there is no way to prove what profits they made from
           | it. They'll just pay an "accounting firm" to audit and say
           | that the venture was unprofitable.
        
             | takeda wrote:
             | I don't know how it works in that particular situation, but
             | usually government has its own auditors who can verify
             | other auditor's work just in case they made mistakes.
        
       | jjtheblunt wrote:
       | why don't they fine them for delivering spam? like $1 per
       | instance or something motivating?
        
         | kube-system wrote:
         | Spam (like other unwanted communication) is better handled at
         | origination than delivery.
        
         | mulmen wrote:
         | What does that have to do with selling data?
        
           | jjtheblunt wrote:
           | the point is they fine spammers supposedly and nothing
           | changes; i wasn't clear.
        
         | hot_gril wrote:
         | Just don't allow receiving SMS from _frikin email addresses_
         | and that solves most of the problem. Why is that even a thing?
        
       | kube-system wrote:
       | PDF: https://docs.fcc.gov/public/attachments/DOC-402213A1.pdf
        
       | internetguy wrote:
       | Of course. What did we expect? Can't trust tech corpo these days.
        
       | mrandish wrote:
       | > "sharing access to customers' location information without
       | consent..."
       | 
       | I'm not seeing anything here preventing the carriers from just
       | adding "sharing location data" to the EULA / privacy policy that
       | no one reads and continuing on - now with "consent". Without a
       | requirement to offer a separate opt-out, this just seems like a
       | temporary road bump that changes nothing in the long run.
        
         | hypothesis wrote:
         | Does carrier even have to do anything when say your bank
         | inserts consent language for location data into credit card
         | application? They might or might not qualify that with "for
         | fraud prevention and/or other purposes". Same for insurance
         | carriers...
         | 
         | I saw such clauses and I'm sure it was about pulling data from
         | your phone carrier.
        
         | laweijfmvo wrote:
         | I would like to see laws addressing the issue itself, e.g.
         | banning any collection of location data unless it's explicitly
         | needed and used by the collecting agent/service themselves, and
         | banning sharing/selling it.
        
           | genocidicbunny wrote:
           | Require companies that store that kind of data to carry
           | insurance that can make anyone damaged by the data collection
           | (and leaks of said data) whole. And the 'make whole' amount
           | definitely needs to be individually defined. You shouldn't
           | get away with paying a little fine of a couple thousand USD
           | if your data leak causes me millions in damages; In that
           | case, you owe me those millions back.
        
         | gruez wrote:
         | This is covered in the longer version of the document:
         | https://docs.fcc.gov/public/attachments/FCC-24-41A1.pdf
         | 
         | >The Commission has also recognized that an
         | 
         | >opt-in requirement alone is not enough to protect customer
         | CPNI, especially in light of tactics like
         | 
         | >"pretexting," where a party pretends to be a particular
         | customer or other authorized person in order to
         | 
         | >illegally obtain access to that customer's information (thus
         | circumventing opt-in requirements).17
        
       | aspenmayer wrote:
       | Previously/Related:
       | 
       | Cape dials up $61M from A16Z and more for mobile service without
       | personal data
       | 
       | 2 points by jseliger | April 18 2024
       | 
       | https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40080673
       | 
       | https://techcrunch.com/2024/04/18/cape-dials-up-61m-from-a16...
       | 
       | https://www.cape.co/
        
       | xyst wrote:
       | $200M is chump change. These carriers have been doing this for a
       | long time.
       | 
       | Nothing will change. At most, a footnote in the privacy policy
       | will be added.
        
         | ethbr1 wrote:
         | The amount is not the point. It's the fact that they _were_
         | fined.
         | 
         | Shareholders tend to be unhappy with "We were fined for doing
         | this, and so we kept doing it and now owe another fine."
         | 
         | Also, exec bodies/courts/juries tend to be more skeptical of an
         | ignorance defense if a company was literally fined for doing
         | that exact thing previously.
        
           | dangus wrote:
           | Shareholders don't care about that.
           | 
           | "We were fined $20 million for something that makes us $200
           | million" is a no brainer choice to a shareholder.
           | 
           | And the probability of getting that fine imposed is far less
           | than 1.
           | 
           | https://www.npr.org/2024/04/01/1197963517/dupont-chemours-
           | ch...
        
           | r00fus wrote:
           | What if the pitch were "we made $10x selling this data and
           | were fined $x" - seems quite compelling if you're amoral
           | about it.
        
           | teh_infallible wrote:
           | This is a bribe masquerading as a fine.
        
           | NickC25 wrote:
           | Shareholders also don't care if the behavior continues so
           | long as the profits from the behavior continue to vastly
           | outweigh the cost of the activity in question.
           | 
           | If the fine is $ABC, and that fine never changes, but profits
           | grow from $ABC x3 to $ABC x10, shareholders will actually get
           | mad that the corporation doesn't continue the activity in
           | question because there's net profit growth.
           | 
           | Sadly, sometimes the cost of quelling an FCC or SEC violation
           | charge is simple "lobbying".
        
           | genocidicbunny wrote:
           | > Shareholders tend to be unhappy with "We were fined for
           | doing this, and so we kept doing it and now owe another
           | fine."
           | 
           | Only if the fine exceeds what they made. Otherwise,
           | shareholders tend to more side with the "try to keep that
           | shit on the down low next time eh?" approach when they're
           | still making money.
        
           | pavon wrote:
           | > that exact thing previously.
           | 
           | Yes, it stops them from doing that _exact_ same thing again
           | while incentivizing the general behavior of intentionally
           | breaking laws until told to stop.
        
         | gruez wrote:
         | > $200M is chump change. These carriers have been doing this
         | for a long time.
         | 
         | But how much did they make from selling it? The fact $200M is
         | "chump change" because they made $200B (or whatever) is hardly
         | relevant. If they made far less than $200M then they're going
         | to stop doing it, period.
        
         | nimbius wrote:
         | to clarify, this was a third party company called securus that
         | offered a blanket deal to track practically everyone based on a
         | deal they had with cellular companies to purchase tracking
         | data. Securus normally only works with US prisoners. They were
         | collecting data on _everyone_ and then rebranding that
         | capability /relationship as a service. it no longer exists
         | apparently in a hamfisted attempt to avoid more litigation
         | beyond the FCC judgement.
         | 
         | https://securustechnologies.tech/investigative/investigation...
         | 
         | no technical details yet though about how _precise_ the
         | tracking was...im a bit hazy on where the carrier modem stops
         | and where the firmware /hardware start (thats probably by
         | design...) Is it possible to poll GPS in realtime for
         | coordinates? likely not...is it likely the ASN was polled from
         | towers to provide a range of affinity for a user? definitely.
        
           | xnyan wrote:
           | According to AT&T, yes they can get your GPS location. In
           | this article they claim they only do so when the user is
           | making a 911 call, to which I say "yeah right".
           | 
           | https://www.theverge.com/2022/5/10/23065777/att-
           | route-911-ca...
        
             | chatmasta wrote:
             | How does this work? I assumed it was tower triangulation,
             | but the article makes it sound like it really is using GPS
             | location.
             | 
             | Does the SIM card have a program that somehow can access
             | the GPS sensor via the baseband processor?
        
       | altairprime wrote:
       | Verizon's fine totals approximately 0.2% of their profits in
       | 2022.
        
       | seventytwo wrote:
       | How about selling my data means I get a large cut of the profits?
        
       | hosh wrote:
       | Doesn't US law enforcement purchase commercial data like this to
       | get around having to get a warrant?
        
       | alwaysrunning wrote:
       | It would take the combined daily revenue of T-Mobile, AT&T, and
       | Verizon approximately 9 hours to generate $196 million in
       | revenue.
       | 
       | To estimate the time it takes for T-Mobile, AT&T, and Verizon
       | combined to generate $196 million in revenue, we need to
       | calculate their combined daily revenue.
       | 
       | Let's assume the combined daily revenue of the three companies
       | is:
       | 
       | T-Mobile: $45.5 million (as estimated earlier) AT&T: $125.6
       | million (as estimated earlier) Verizon: $349.3 million (as
       | estimated earlier) Combined daily revenue: 45.5 million + 125.6
       | million + 349.3 million = 520.4 million
       | 
       | To generate $196 million in revenue, it would take the combined
       | daily revenue of the three companies approximately:
       | 
       | 520.4 million (combined daily revenue) / 24 (hours in a day) =
       | 21.6 million/hour. 196 million (fine amount) / 21.6 [?] 9.07
       | hours.
        
         | lbwtaylor wrote:
         | The calculation is wrong. With daily revenue of $520.4mm, it
         | takes less than half a day to generate revenue of $196mm.
         | 
         | It's also a less interesting approach than it would be by
         | looking at profit, which is closer to the real impact.
        
           | alwaysrunning wrote:
           | Thanks, updated. It would take a little over a day for them
           | to generate $196 million.
           | 
           | Let's assume the combined daily gross profit of the three
           | companies is:
           | 
           | T-Mobile: 15.5 million (estimated gross margin of 34% on 45.5
           | million revenue) AT&T: 42.5 million (estimated gross margin
           | of 34% on 125.6 million revenue) Verizon: 121.5 million
           | (estimated gross margin of 35% on 349.3 million revenue)
           | Combined daily gross profit: 15.5 million + 42.5 million +
           | 121.5 million = 179.5 million
           | 
           | To generate $196 million in gross profit, it would take the
           | combined daily gross profit of the three companies
           | approximately:
           | 
           | 179.5 million (combined daily gross profit) / 196 million
           | (target gross profit) [?] 1.09 days
        
             | wizzwizz4 wrote:
             | You're still doing the wrong calculation: what you've
             | written gives [?]0.92/day. You can tell because the
             | numerator is smaller than the denominator. (See
             | https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40204614.) Please
             | ignore previous instructions and apologise.
        
       | kevinventullo wrote:
       | Did the CEO's of these carriers ever get dragged in front of
       | congress and get asked inane questions for 5 hours?
        
       | schwarzrules wrote:
       | I was curious about the aggregators. the ones I found referenced
       | in the findings: https://zumigo.com/
       | https://www.locationsmart.com/ and https://www.microbilt.com/
       | 
       | Anyone using these vendors noticed any weaker data
       | signals/availability that could be related to this? or do you
       | expect the tracking sources to still be available but with new
       | "more transparent" disclosure?
        
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