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Samsung neigbor wants to use my mobile hotspot. Can I limit sharing to her device and 2GB? Can I block my phone from downloading? Can I filter domains?

C

cutedroid

Well-Known Member
A neighbor friend has asked me if she can hop on my wifi. She says she can help pay for wifi. I know how to enable mobile hotspot on my Samsung S9+ running Android 10. But I do have some questions:
  1. Can I limit sharing to just her particular phone and block out others who she may accidentally share the hotspot password with?
  2. Can I limit sharing to just a certain number of data (e.g, 2GB)
  3. When I’m sharing, how can I block out my phone from downloading stuff for itself? (To enable Mobile Hotspot, I have to disable Data Saver.)
  4. Can I filter certain categories (like illicit websites)? I don’t want to be responsible for other people’s usage.
 
What you are asking for is an app like Net Nanny, but that app goes on a child's phone. I don't know if it would work putting it on your phone and then limit your neighbors access.

Maybe someone else here will have a better idea on what to do.

Good luck, myself I wouldn't share my wifi. Your wifi IP traces back to you.
 
If I go into my phone's hotspot settings and dig deep enough (all the way down to "advanced" on my phone, yours may differ) there is an option to limit the amount of data that can be used. But there's nothing to say that refers to a particular billing cycle (what I guess you want) rather than a particular session (i.e. will be reset whenever you turn the hotspot off), so I can't be sure precisely what the means in practice. And of course that's not a limit for a particular device, it's a limit for all devices using the hotspot, so would include any of yours as well as hers.

I don't know whether you can stop someone connecting another device, though you might be able to work around it by making it a "hidden" network once the intended device is connected (hiding the SSID should make it harder for someone to add another device).

I've no idea about question 3, as I've never used the data saver. Presumably you are asking because you have quite a limited mobile data allowance? You could install a firewall app and block access for apps you don't want to have access, but it's probably not a single click solution. I've also not used such apps with the hotspot: non-root firewalls use a VPN for filtering, but whether they filter the hotspot connection I don't know. You could probably do some testing yourself. This could be relevant to your question 4.

But I'm a little confused, because the initial request seems to be to use your WiFi. Do you not actually have WiFi? Because that's the only reason I can think of for even thinking about your phone's hotspot. Otherwise it would be a question of your router's access control settings. And of course if you go out she loses WiFi access if you are relying on the hotspot. Does she actually know that it's your phone hotspot you are thinking about, rather than a simple WiFi connection?
 
It's a bad idea.
Service providers generally frown on people using their phone hotspot as a primary internet connection and may disable it for what they deem to be excessive use.
Also it's likely there is a monthly data cap on the hotspot which may be independent from your main phone data. For example I have unlimited data but a 15GB limit on my phone hotspot. So if this is the case you could end up being over the limit due to your neighbor's online activity.
Further, if something they do violates your provider's terms of service (such as illegal downloading of media content etc) it will end up being your problem and could result in your phone service being terminated (extreme but not impossible).
There are limited options in your phone for controlling the wifi hotspot, other than setting the login credentials and limiting the number of users. If you were sharing an actual ISP connection through a router there would be much more control available.
 
Fox Mulder said:
Service providers generally frown on people using their phone hotspot as a primary internet connection and may disable it for what they deem to be excessive use.
Also it's likely there is a monthly data cap on the hotspot which may be independent from your main phone data. For example I have unlimited data but a 15GB limit on my phone hotspot. So if this is the case you could end up being over the limit due to your neighbor's online activity.
Click to expand...
I don't think my service provider would frown; I have a plan that gives me a limited amount of data. every tier I go higher, I pay more. Why should they care if the data is consumed on my phone or through a hotspot. That's still money for them.

Perhaps you're talking about cell plans that have unlimited data? (That isn't my case)
 
cutedroid said:
A neighbor friend has asked me if she can hop on my wifi. She says she can help pay for wifi. I know how to enable mobile hotspot on my Samsung S9+ running Android 10. But I do have some questions:
  1. Can I limit sharing to just her particular phone and block out others who she may accidentally share the hotspot password with?
  2. Can I limit sharing to just a certain number of data (e.g, 2GB)
Click to expand...

With Samsung phones you can limit the number of simultaneous connected devices, and the amount of data the hotspot uses.

cutedroid said:
  1. When I’m sharing, how can I block out my phone from downloading stuff for itself? (To enable Mobile Hotspot, I have to disable Data Saver.)
Click to expand...

Check all the auto-update options for apps etc. are turned off.

cutedroid said:
  1. Can I filter certain categories (like illicit websites)? I don’t want to be responsible for other people’s usage.
Click to expand...

There are things like Net Nanny, as already mentioned. But any net filtering and blocking is very easy to bypass by using a VPN. Which is something I use all the tine. If one is looking at "illicit websites" while using VPN encryption the carrier or ISP can't see it.
 
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Since my Samsung updated to Android 14 yesterday I've been looking at the hotspot settings again (and found one of them had been changed silently - thanks Samsung!), and I've not found a setting for limiting the number of devices yet. That said they seem to go out of their way to make it hard to discover where some of these settings are, e.g. the "data limit" setting has disappeared from the "advanced" hotspot settings: you now have to tap on the display of today's hotspot data usage and that opens a hidden menu with the data limit setting! I don't know whether this is a Google or a Samsung brainwave, but it's moronic user interface design. So it may be that there is such a setting still, but I just haven't found what it's been hidden under yet (though I have tried to tap everything I can see in the hotspot and mobile tethering section in case there is some further setting hidden under it...), or it may be that they've removed it.

On the plus side it does now tell you that the data limit is a daily quota, whereas previously it didn't say what period it covers. So it's now clearer what it does, but harder to find in the first place.
 
Even if you get answers to your access questions, may I strongly suggest you tell her that you just don't know? Friendships are far more important than taking such risks.
 
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