Wi-Fi Assist is improved in iOS 9.3 beta 1, to allow users to track the amount of data used

Earlier this month, we told you about the teenager who received a $2000 bill from his carrier thanks to Apple's Wi-Fi Assist. The feature takes a weak Wi-Fi connection and automatically switches it to a cellular connection belonging to the user's mobile operator. Since Wi-Fi Assist is on by default, someone with an iPhone running iOS 9 could ring up huge overage charges without knowing about it.

The subject of class action suits, Wi-Fi Assist is getting something new with iOS 9.3 beta 1. Underneath the toggle used to turn Wi-Fi Assist on or off, you will find a figure that shows how much data has been used by the feature during the current month. If you monitor this number, you can see if Wi-Fi Assist is using too much data.

Had Apple had this in place earlier, teenager Ashton Finegold could have noticed that he was using an alarming amount of data with Wi-Fi Assist. In the teen's particular case, he thought that he was using a Wi-Fi connection while using his Apple iPhone. But as it turns out, the Wi-Fi signal in his room was extremely weak, which led Wi-Fi Assist to constantly switch to a cellular connection. Even though Ashton thought that he was connected to a Wi-Fi signal, he was actually burning through 144GB of data from his unnamed wireless operator in just one month.

source: Gizmodo