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Google Home Speakers Download Hundreds of GBs in Background
Confirmed
In Short: Google Home Speaker owners are reporting that their devices are downloading hundreds of gigabytes of data in the background, potentially breaching data caps for those with limited internet plans.
Google Home Speaker owners are reporting that their devices are downloading hundreds of gigabytes of data in the background, potentially breaching data caps for those with limited internet plans.
According to reports from multiple users, some Google Home Speakers have been downloading up to 132 GB of data over the past 30 days, with one device downloading 41 GB on October 13 alone.
In one instance, an unused Google Home Speaker consumed 17 GB of data in just 24 hours, raising concerns among users with limited data plans.
Users on Reddit have shared screenshots showing data usage of up to 3 TB over 30 days, with some reporting that their speakers repeatedly download firmware updates of around 460 MB every 20 minutes.
Google acknowledged the issue and stated that a fix is already rolling out to address the problem.
Users can check their device usage graphs in the Google Home app's Wifi tab to monitor data consumption.
The issue appears to be caused by the speakers failing to correctly download and install firmware updates, leading to repeated downloads.
For users with limited data plans, this could result in unexpected overages and significant charges.
Google has not specified if certain models of Google Home speakers are more prone to this issue, but the problem seems to be affecting new models.
What this adds
The sources have not established whether specific models of Google Home speakers are more prone to this issue, or if the problem is widespread across all models.
Background
Google Home Speaker owners report their devices downloading hundreds of gigabytes of data, potentially breaching data caps for those with limited plans.
What's confirmed
- A second, lightly used Home Speaker in a different household downloaded only 2 GB in a month.
- Google Home Speaker owners report that the device is downloading hundreds of gigabytes of data in the background.
What's still developing
- Lol Most routers let you check how much data a particular device has used.
- To make matters worse, the user reported that although their speaker kept downloading the update, it didn’t actually update the firmware.
- There's no word on whether specific models of Google Home speaker are more prone to this than others, but certain posts have noted that their new Home speaker is responsible for this massive data drain.
- Google has already confirmed to 9to5 Google that it is working on a fix for this problem, which is likely to be an enormous relief for anyone currently suffering with massive data bills.
- If you have a Google Home smart speaker, then it's definitely worth checking out to make sure you're not impacted by this bug.
- Other users there describe three speakers using around 280GB, and screenshots show over 3TB in 30 days.
- “This post made me have a look and yep, 300GB in 30 days,” shared a Redditor.
- A big concern for anyone with a limited data plan here is that the bug could quickly eat through the allotted limit, and they wouldn’t know unless they regularly check to see how much data their devices are using.
- Kendall County Coroner Jacquie Purcell said Hastert died on Monday due to natural causes at his home.
- He was then sentenced to serve 15 months in federal prison, two years of supervised release, and ordered to undergo “sex-offender treatment” — paying a $250,000 fine to a victims’ fund.
- “Nothing is more stunning than to have the words ‘serial child molester’ and ‘speaker of the House’ in the same sentence,” U.S. District Judge Thomas Durkin said of Hastert when he sentenced him, at age 74, to prison.