T-Mobile Reports to the FCC that an IM Client Overloads Service to Major City

Fierce Wireless is reporting that Big Magenta reported to the FCC last December that their services to a “major city” were overloaded and essentially shutdown by a 3rd party IM app released in the Android Market.

A quote from the article:

T-Mobile network service was temporarily degraded recently when an independent application developer released an Android-based instant messaging application that was designed to refresh its network connection with substantial frequency,

The T-Mobile statement does not identify the city, or the IM app inquestion.  What caused the overload was that just one device using the app starting using 1200 times the amount of data considered normal.  Multiply that over hundreds if not thousands of handsets….well you are getting the picture.  The amount of data being requested was exponentially larger than what T-Mobile was prepared infrastructure wise, and it caused one mighty data clog.

Magenta used the filing with the FCC to make a pitch for wireless carriers to “prioritize application data” that they are serving.  An interesting argument that can be looked at as another attempt on a carriers part to oppose “net neutrality” in the name of serving consumers what they want.

Either way, we are seeing continuing signs that Android data use is going through the roof, a great indicator that the platform is indeed growing.