Comcast Enters Hotspot-Sharing Agreement With European Partners
By technology editor Ian Bush
PHILADELPHIA (CBS) -- Data plans for smartphones, tablets, and other computers can be a big expense for an overseas trip. But starting later this year, Comcast is giving its Internet customers an incentive when traveling to Europe for work or play.
It's a deal that allows Comcast's data customers to hop on more than 2½ million WiFi hotspots across the UK and Europe for no additional charge.
Liberty Global runs the Wi-Free and WifiSpots Internet access points in many European countries from Ireland to the Netherlands, from Poland to Switzerland.
The partnership also allows customers of the London-based company to use Comcast WiFi when they're on our shores.
About two petabytes (two million gigabytes) worth of data pass through Comcast's several million public hotspots every month, and the US cable giant says our appetite for data is only growing, with the number of people on their Xfinity WiFi tripling since last year.