I had a 3G to 4G TCU upgrade to prove a point.

[imkazaam]

Yes, I think the confusion (mine at least) comes from your comment of "bypassing the cell towers", so I'm not exactly sure what solution architecture (or feature set) you're describing.

There were two different challenges being discussed. One was about hardware where I mentioned an aftermarket solution to connect the car to your phone without needing a cell tower in between. Connecting the car directly is ideal and was proposed by me. The other discussion was about security. Someone else was saying whatever solution he'd imagined involved using the cell provider as an ISP and thus would be insecure "there goes your security" was the comment IIRC. Except online banking works fine with a cell tower as the ISP or any other ISP, so security is a nonissue.

If you find an aftermarket module that replicates functionality (charge schedule, specifically) of the BMW app without using BMW servers, please do post it here. I know I'm interested at least. Especially if it's just over wifi and has no monthly recurring costs.

If someone had the time I'm sure there's a lot of old 2g and 3g technology that isn't useful anymore with LTE and 5G being what is in vogue now. I wonder if people have done this in some of the other i3 groups, like on facebook, etc.