Consumer Reports: AT&T the Worst Cell Carrier

Turns out all those sotto voce grumbles about lost signals were more than just anecdotal gripes. In its latest annual ranking Consumer Reports deemed AT&T to be the worst cell phone carrier in the United States.

Needless to say, this is not the kind of news that AT&T is particularly excited to trumpet. In last year's ranking, the company finished next-to-last nationally. But in a statement, AT&T nonetheless painted the glass as half full.

"We take this seriously and we continually look for new ways to improve the customer experience. The fact is wireless customers have choices and a record number of them chose AT&T in the third quarter, significantly more than our competitors. Hard data from independent drive tests confirms AT&T has the nation's fastest mobile broadband network with our nearest competitor 20 percent slower on average nationwide and our largest competitor 60 percent slower on average nationwide. And, our dropped call rate is within 1/10 of a percent - the equivalent of just one call in a thousand - of the industry leader."