If you log on to your comcast/xfinity acount and /services/manage device (your modem) It will show you a bar graph of what you have supposedly used – according to them.
This (high usage stats) has been going on for a long time, finally decided to look at it. It said I had used 121GB so far this month on Nov 7. ??? (450GB last month) I probably had actually used 1GB, since I d/l win11 LAST month. So where was it coming from??? My beast router (Arris AC1750) did not have any usage statistics. Found a very old ASUS RT-N56U router in the closet so using that for now because it shows stats. Of course I would immediately suspect the streaming device, but router says maybe 20MB/day. For everything.
So maybe it’s lying???, so unplug RJ45 from back of modem overnight, but comcast says usage still going up at about 17GB/day even when nothing plugged to modem. Got on phone to comcast and second tech I talked to actually tried to help and after a long time was reading his notes and mumbled something about “xfinity home devices” having high “usage” ” – modem? would have to try. Unplugged coax from back of modem and stats stayed same. Grabbed a Netgear CM500 cable modem from microcenter and called comcast and had them change my MAC addy and my usage hasn’t changed from 130GB since.
Apparently some cable modems (Mine was a Arris SB6141 that I had had for a few years) chat with the ISP continuously. I am guessing that is the fault of the way Arris set up the firmware in it but don’t know. I do know that the Netgear (that was my first Netgear product ever) does NOT.
So , problem solved. I will have to replace that ASUS router since its firmware is 2013, but that is simple – will def get one that has usage stats! Netgear AC1200 or AC1900 or something…
If I had to guess, I would guess that any Arris or Motorola device, or anything rented from Xfinity, would have that problem. I do not think they are doing it on purpose. I think they just don’t know.
Then again, since the tech that changed the MAC for me also tied to upsell me (I’m on 200Mbps service) once he discovered I was trying to fix high usage, maybe it’s intentional. Now that would be scarry!!! Let’s hope it is unintentional and they will fix it as soon as they hear about it…
