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AT&T today announced a much-needed international data plans for the iPhone. This should make the iPhone much cheaper to use outside the U.S. than it has been.

Some folks have received unexpectedly large (sometimes well in to the thousands of dollars) phone bills after coming home from a trip, because the iPhone automatically checks for e-mail by default, leading it to continuously access carrier networks.

Not a problem at home where you pay a flat fee for unlimited data access, but a real problem when you're paying by the kilobyte in a foreign country. While you can disable the automatic e-mail checking feature, a lot of iPhone travelers, unfortunately didn’t know or realize it. That is even if they even knew international roaming could pose a problem or in the first place.

With AT&T's new international data plans for the iPhone, for $59.99, on top of your standard iPhone data plan, you get 50MB of international data access in 29 countries (Canada, China, Mexico and parts of Europe and Asia) per month, as well as international voice roaming and international long distance dialing from the United States at standard rates.

50MB see like too much? Then you may want to consider AT&T's new $24.99 a month 20MB international plan.

Should you go over 50MB or 20MB a month, depending on which plan you've signed up for, you pay an additional $.005 per kilobyte. Use the iPhone outside the 29 supported countries and you pay $.0195 per kilobyte.

Click here to see if a country you plan on traveling to is supported by AT&Ts' new international plans for the iPhone.