TLDR: Use a secure VPN to prevent DPI On your laptop, change packet TTL to 65 (iOS default 64 plus one). ••• On my recent mountain biking trip to France I accidentally booked an Airbnb without WiFi. Bummer. But hey, 5 minutes of googling and I found a perfect eSim provider that offers unlimited data for only €19/week. Who needs slow DSL-based WiFi in the apartment, when you can have 4G everywhere? After placing an order and scanning the QR-code landed in my inbox I was up and running in 30 seconds (gosh I love eSim). SpeedTest showed a strong 65 Mbit/s connection. Perfect. The only problem was - the “personal hotspot” mode didn’t work at all. As it turns out (after reading the small grey text at the bottom of their landing page) the operator does not support data sharing on unlimited plans. Challenge accepted. Let the hacking begin. How do mobile carriers detect "personal hotspot"? In short: by deep packet inspection and TCP/IP stack fingerprinting. And sometimes, your iPhone...