iPhone draining gigs of data

[itsmoolla]

I have recently been having a problem with my iPhone draining enormous amounts of data. I noticed a while ago that data was being consumed far quicker than usual. I went into settings and noticed that "system services" had consumed an unusual amount of data (over 800mb). The next screen showed me the the culprit was something called "iTunes media services".

Now before you all jump down my throat and tell me to turn off Mobile Data for iCloud, music, photos, etc, etc. it's all been turned off since the day I got the iPhone. I am not even subscribed to Apple Music. I have subsequently deleted iTunes, the Music app and yet, this data drain persists.

Since i reset data statistics yesterday on my phone, 180mb has disappeared through this mysterious avenue.

Some quick 'research' showed that this is a common problem with no solution:

https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/itunes-media-services.2145297/
https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/itunes-media-services-data-usage.2143950/
https://discussions.apple.com/thread/8352487

I really have no idea what to do and the data keeps growing wings. Please help!

 

[namzsteve]

There is a restrictions place in your settings app, you can totally disable itunes apps in there and see if that help, also has background app refresh somewhere in there

 

[itsmoolla]

There is a restrictions place in your settings app, you can totally disable itunes apps in there and see if that help, also has background app refresh somewhere in there

Thanks for the reply.
The restrictions apply to type of content, not data usage. In any case, mobile data is completely off for "iTunes & AppStore" in settings.
My background app refresh has been turned off for all apps since the day I got my phone.

 

[Cassady]

I had something similar about 2 iphone versions back. My screen was replaced under warranty, and I'm fairly certain something went haywire between me receiving a refurbished device from Core/iStore, and the switchover i.t.o. my iCloud etc., between the old/original phone, and the replacement.

Long story short, it appeared to be trying to 'phone home' to the cloud in the background. The phone, when woken, would literally get hot as I was holding it, as it was trying to reconnect to some core-something in the background, and it was blowing through data... something like 2GBs of data in two days – and keep in mind this was in the time of the iPhone 6S...

And the 'awesome' part was that I had literally disabled every setting there was to try and prevent it, but this was beyond my control. Something in System Services had become corrupted, and it wasn't going to stop trying to connect to whatever service it needed to at the Apple Mothership, until it had been resolved.

I cannot even remember what I did in the end. But it involved a nuke-and-pave. Never had anything similar since then, and fairly certain mine was an outlier. But I mention this just to make the point that if it's something deep inside the system software, there's very little you can do to prevent what it will do. I would either take it in, or contact Apple Support on the international number. And if that's too much of a schlepp, then nuking it, and starting over will presumably be the last resort... Good luck!

 

[itsmoolla]

I had something similar about 2 iphone versions back. My screen was replaced under warranty, and I'm fairly certain something went haywire between me receiving a refurbished device from Core/iStore, and the switchover i.t.o. my iCloud etc., between the old/original phone, and the replacement.

Long story short, it appeared to be trying to 'phone home' to the cloud in the background. The phone, when woken, would literally get hot as I was holding it, as it was trying to reconnect to some core-something in the background, and it was blowing through data... something like 2GBs of data in two days – and keep in mind this was in the time of the iPhone 6S...

And the 'awesome' part was that I had literally disabled every setting there was to try and prevent it, but this was beyond my control. Something in System Services had become corrupted, and it wasn't going to stop trying to connect to whatever service it needed to at the Apple Mothership, until it had been resolved.

I cannot even remember what I did in the end. But it involved a nuke-and-pave. Never had anything similar since then, and fairly certain mine was an outlier. But I mention this just to make the point that if it's something deep inside the system software, there's very little you can do to prevent what it will do. I would either take it in, or contact Apple Support on the international number. And if that's too much of a schlepp, then nuking it, and starting over will presumably be the last resort... Good luck!

Thank you for your reply, I think I'll follow that exact course of action:

1) iStore
2) Apple Support International
3) total wipe and restore