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I noticed some weird traffic pattern on my internet connection, tracked it back to my iPad, after some tinkering I finally realized that my iPad is downloading iOS 6.1 on it's own!!! I didn't ask for it, and there's no button or obvious means to stop it. For now, I've disabled the WiFi; but seriously, this is terrible, how do I stop it?

The device: iPad 2 - running iOS 5.1 - No intention to upgrade anytime soon

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You cannot. This is the way it is now. And even if you did delete the IPSW, iOS will just download it again. Apple really wants you to update. – cksum Jan 29 at 16:53
Damn, it's consuming bandwidth. – Parsa Jan 29 at 20:39
Just to emphasize, iOS does not automatically update itself. On an iPad 2 and 5.1.x, you should only be seeing an alert badge in Settings/General and then on the Software Update pane? bar? itself. – Zo219 Jan 31 at 7:31
That's what I expect it to do. It's not, it's trying to download the iOS on it's own without asking. – Parsa Jan 31 at 11:58
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No. It will only download the update, taking up space on your iPad. It will never automatically update you. – cksum Feb 1 at 23:29
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In short, you can't stop the download once the OS has been told to download it (normally several taps are needed to get to the settings and initiate the download, but perhaps there's a bug where it starts in some rare instances uncommanded).

First of all, I highly suggest you update to iOS 6 because developers are constantly dropping support for iOS 5 for great developer tools that are iOS 6 specific. As for how to stop auto updates, after 45 minutes of searching, I think I found a solution. Doing this will also disable automatic downloads.

Here is what you (or others in your situation) can do: Navigate to General > Store on your iPad. Next, turn on the switch that is labeled "Use cellular data". That will help most, but in your case, you mentioned turning off WiFi - so if you are concerned about that bandwidth, you'll have to keep networking off until you get to a network where bandwidth or cost for traffic isn't an issue.

This doesn't actually stop the download permanently, but will tell the OS to not burn your data plan and wait to complete the download over WiFi. Now, your phone will retain that downloaded OS image until such time as you erase the device and restore from a backup (where the download is not backed up and will be lost) or apply the update.

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Nice edit @bmike. Thank you people. – Parsa Feb 1 at 18:25

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