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Vuze Study Exposes P2P Throttling By Canadian ISP Cogeco
Posted by
Soulskill
on Thu Apr 24, 2008 04:14 AM
from the don't-mind-us dept.
from the don't-mind-us dept.
urbanriot writes "Despite a growing number of complaints on the popular North American consumer broadband site BroadbandReports, employees working for the Canadian cable internet provider Cogeco have publicly denied interfering with torrents on their network. However, a recent plugin put out by the Vuze team exposed Cogeco of being the second worst ISP globally, of those tested. So far, Cogeco has failed to respond to these findings, but recent coverage from the mainstream media and Michael Geist may prompt them to finally admit to their controversial practices."
The report by the Vuze team has some interesting information about other ISPs from around the world as well. Prior to this, Bell Canada was taking most of the flak in Canada for traffic management.
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[+]
Your Rights Online: Bell Canada Throttles Wholesalers Without Notice 239 comments
knorthern knight writes "The Canadian family-run ISP Teksavvy (which is popular among Canadian P2P users precisely because it does not throttle P2P) has started noticing that Bell Canada is throttling traffic before it reaches wholesale partners. According to Teksavvy CEO Rocky Gaudrault, Bell has implemented 'load balancing' to 'manage bandwidth demand' during peak congestion times — but apparently didn't feel the need to inform partner ISPs or customers. The result is a bevy of annoyed customers and carriers across the great white north."
[+]
Your Rights Online: AT&T Denies Resetting P2P Connections 112 comments
betaville points out comments AT&T filed with the FCC in which they denied throttling traffic by resetting P2P file-sharing connections. Earlier this week, a study published by the Vuze team found AT&T to have the 25th highest (13th highest if extra Comcast networks are excluded) median reset rate among the sampled networks. In the past, AT&T has defended Comcast's throttling practices, and said it wants to monitor its network traffic for IP violations.
"AT&T vice president of Internet and network systems research Charles Kalmanek, in a letter addressed to Vuze CEO Gilles BianRosa, said that peer-to-peer resets can arise from numerous local network events, including outages, attacks, reconfigurations or overall trends in Internet usage. 'AT&T does not use "false reset messages" to manage its network,' Kalmanek said in the letter. Kalmanek noted that Vuze's analysis said the test 'cannot conclude definitively that any particular network operator is engaging in artificial or false [reset] packet behavior.'"
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this is why we need competition (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:this is why we need competition (Score:5, Insightful)
Parent
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So, you think the clerk or the sales is going to be aware of these "technical" issues or marketting strategies?
If you'd inform, you'll only hear the things you want to hear or what they've been trained to parrot to you, so you'll sign up and they have another consumer. Once a consumer signs, even with "better alternatives", many wont research because they don't like the hassle to move to another provider or
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The 'Truth in Corporate Public Statements Act'
I would have sworn there is one, but neither Comcast nor Vuze has been sued or fined for their materially false statements.
As a sweetener, the law should have a "spirit of the law" clause to keep companies from making technically accurate but misleading statements. Either tell the plain truth or say 'no comment'.
Re:this is why we need competition (Score:5, Interesting)
We, the people, should own ALL things "infrastructure" and allow companies to use it for providing services. AT&T can't be allowed to own the wires and switches any longer. Comcast can't be allowed to own the cables any longer. And rather like patents and copyrights, these monopolies should be allowed for only a specified amount of time but should not exceed the time it takes to recoup the costs of building the infrastructure. After that, they lose their monopoly. (And to add incentive to these parties, they can extend their temporary monopolies any time they upgrade the infrastructure...say by putting fiber at EVERY door.)
They have gotten away with cherry picking and raising prices without improving services for far too long. Their regional monopolies demonstrably harm the consumer. I find it amazing what they have been getting away with.
Parent
Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
I know you're thinking "cables", but could it also mean the healthcare system? How about food stores? Clothing stores? Or perhaps the land that everybody sits their house upon? Maybe the houses themselves could be considered "infrastructure" and should be owned collectively by the government?
Ooops, I just used the word collectivism.
So much for free will of the individual.
"HISTORY has shown that Government is like fire: a troublesome servant & a DEADLY master. Never should it b
Re:this is why we need competition (Score:4, Informative)
"Healthcare" is not even remotely within that description. Land ownership is even further removed.
The prevention of ownership of infrastructure *IS* a pro choice move. It allows multiple service providers to compete across the same media offering "pro-choice" to the consumer. Regional monopolies are still monopolies and cases of abuse are frequent. I'm not talking about socialized services. Only publicly owned infrastructure. The Public Utilities Commissions which were created to prevent the need for public ownership of infrastructure has failed in its mission where it has permitted cherry picking and inconsistent levels of service. There are places in Texas and all across the U.S. that still have no water and no power, forget about broadband internet access and cell phone coverage.
Parent
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The Public Utilities Commissions which were created to prevent the need for public ownership of infrastructure has failed in its mission where it has permitted cherry picking and inconsistent levels of service
Those Commissions haven't "failed". They were defanged by a decade of deregulation and pro-business lobbies that denied them (in all but a few states) the power to regulate ISPs and the Wireless Industry.
I can't speak for other states, but the NYS Public Service Commission is pretty damned good at what they do. The few times I've had to escalate a complaint to them I usually wind up talking with a utility executive (typically Verizon) within two business hours. Give them authority over Internet Servi
Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
Well it's still better than what happens when the companies have control. The government is somewhat forced to make it better for the people but companies have no interest in caring for their customers as long as they get the money. And considering the owners of the
Re:this is why we need competition (Score:4, Interesting)
A neighborhood can only have so many buried cables before they start conflicting with each other, with water/sewer/gas lines, etc., particularly since each cable must reach each house. Talk to a civil engineer sometime about the royal PITA known as "Miss Utility" or "OneCall" or the equivalent.
The same neighborhood can have many healthcare providers without similar conflicts. Healthcare is far less a natural monopoly than is sewer service, or roads, or cables.
In the abstract, you'll get no complaints from me. The question, though, is where the competition lies. Just because some portion of the service is community-owned (e.g., roads) doesn't preclude competition at other levels (e.g., package delivery services). Just because the city owns the water and sewer lines doesn't preclude competition among Roto-Rooter and similar home plumbing franchises. Similarly, just because a town decides to own the physical cabling would not preclude competition among firms wishing to use said cabling to provide communication services.
Parent
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Much of the Internet backbone in Sweden is run by SUNET [sunet.se], the Swedish university computer network, or owned by TeliaSonera [teliasonera.com] with strict rules to allow fair usage.
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Utility and internet companies should own their own infrastructure. The only acceptable options are either:
a) One company delivering services to specific areas. This is a great way of securing personal liberty. Don't like the broadband provider for your area? Move house! Don't like the electricity provider in your new area? Move again! Wait, now you have a problem with your telephone provider? Move again, and this time do your research. Rem
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At times I've wondered whether a "telecom authority" may be the best way to go simply for setting up and maintaining cables. But even then I'd be concerned about the technology stagnating under government monopoly...
It's a tricky
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Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
No. On the contrary history has shown that IF a company becomes a monopoly and starts "raping" its customers with outrageous prices, then another competitor will rise-up to provide cheaper alternatives:
- Itunes replaced the CD cartel
- Dish television broke the back of local cable tv monopolies by offering cheaper service
- And now FiOS is providing another form of competition
- The railroads had monopolized pa
DeVry do MBAs now? (Score:2)
It will if the barriers to entry[1] are low or absent. It most certainly isn't the case where they are high - this is why you don't see 19 toll roads or 12 railway lines running in parallel.
[1] Which can be artificial or natural, geographical or political, legal or technical - I could go on - the priciple applies
Re:this is why we need competition (Score:4, Insightful)
Parent
two words: (Score:2)
Keep pushing. (Score:4, Interesting)
Bad ISPs (Score:5, Informative)
That being said, there are many ISPs who also do p2p traffic caching, which is not inherently a bad thing. Certain block lists consider those wrongfully malicious as well.
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Mayb the MPAA should sue them for copyright violation.
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Cogeco response (Score:5, Informative)
http://www.cbc.ca/technology/story/2008/04/22/tech-vuze.html
I'm not sure if I believe them or not. When I lived in Ottawa last year I had friends using Cogeco. Some people had no problems at all with bittorrent while others couldn't use it. It's hard for me to tell if they are blocking some of their customers, or if my friends just couldn't figure out how to set it up.
False advertising? (Score:5, Interesting)
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As for contract modification, these are not "one-time" contracts but continuing agreements. You can terminate at an
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If they dare to send RST packets, intervene with users connection... One wonders what ELSE they could dare to do or already do? Profiling comes to mind.
I believe traffic shaping is ok... (Score:5, Interesting)
... when it's transparent and disclosed. If ISPs believe that traffic shaping is a legitimate cost management solution that most customers wouldn't mind, then fine, make the legitimate case: use traffic shaping and disclose the existence of traffic shaping in your plans the same way maximum bandwidth is disclosed, and we'll let the market decide. Personally, I believe that enough customers wouldn't mind traffic shaping, bandwidth throttling and caps, etc. that in the future we might see different priced "tiers" of internet service, which is fine with me as that would make service pricing more representative of internet use. My ISP wants to bandwidth cap my internet service? Fine, if they disclose these caps at the time that I sign up. Then I'd be free to negotiate with another provider or sign up for a better plan. It's the fact that ISPs today advertise one thing and then deliver another that's truly offensive.
The sneaky underhanded meddling with the service of customers that have existing contracts just undermines the ISPs' case and suggests to regulators and customers that they aren't interested in honestly selling a service.
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They are horrified about another
How to advertise.... (Score:2, Insightful)
How do you adverstise such a thing when less than 10% of your customer base understand the concept behind it? Why would you advertise limited Internet access? I can see the ads
"Tired of the internet pig next door downloading illegal movies next door and bringing YOUR service to a crawl?
Working from home and your work just sits there because the guy next door is sharing all of his music with the rest of the world?
The sex addict down the street is sucking up your internet - BUY FROM US!
We don't feed the internet pigs!
Sign up with us and get your work done!
(in mice type) we throttle P2P, bitorrent, etc...."
See, no probelm.
Re: (Score:2)
Was anyone as surprised as I was ... (Score:2, Interesting)
UIUC - University of Illinois - 90.69%
WN-AZ-AS - Arizona Tri University Network - 89.33%
I'm not saying there is anything nefarious going on there. These networks were only sampled for a short time by a small set of users. The results gathered might not be generally representative of those networks. But it does make you wonder. Are they are blocking / shaping traffic, or do they have a massively ove
Re: (Score:2)
A Press Release (Score:2, Funny)
Incompetence v.s. Malevolence (Score:2, Insightful)
And having a mix of the two makes it even easier to hide behind plausible deniability. Because placing the right person at the right place, i.e. the worst net admin on the most loaded network might be just what it takes.
What if private companies throttled our roads? (Score:2)
To bad I am not a big corporation that can say, I think that blue trucks can only go 40 MPH (64.37376 kph, for the Kanucks) unless they pay me. Even though they are on a public right of way.
Yes this is silly, but so is allowing internet traffic throttling.
This
Nice survey -- still self-selected (Score:2)
Measuring RST is an interesting approach, but is hardly the only or even preferred solution to TCP/IP congestion control. Delaying [queuing] ACK packets is more transparent a
Sample Size (Score:2)
Is it not just as likely that these 22 people have lousy connections, and so installed the plugin to 'prove' its their ISPs fault? Meanwhile, thousands of others have no problems, so have no need or desire to install the plugin.
Comments from an actual Cogeco customer (Score:2)
One the other hand, I have experienced many service providers -- most recently and the Fairmont Banff Springs Hotel -- whose service is crippled.
Flawed Study (Score:3, Insightful)
RST yes, but who sent it? (Score:2)
I just wonder if some of those RSTs might not be coming from bandwidth hogs -- users who disrupt other users service to capture more bandwidth for themselves. cable is shared medium.
Re: (Score:2)
p2p on tcp? (Score:2)
tcp torrent traffic and spam bot traffic are virtually identical. vuze doesn't seem to know this because they look at tcp traffic and p2p lives on both tcp and udp. looking for packets with the rst bit set would better indicate blocked botnet traffic.
It has to be noted that the data gathering techniques Vuze uses are far from optimal. The plugin detects all TCP resets on a connection and doesn't make a distinction between BitTorrent and other traffic, and there is
My Experiance with Cogeco (Score:2)
Its primary selling point for me is that it is better than Bell.
The short version of my story goes like this. I bought a new computer almost a year ago. At one point I decided to download a whole bunch of old TV shows. I went to log on one day and could not. On my second or third try I then was redirected to a URL that basically said "Cogeco disconnected you". So I call up and basically say "WTF?". The answer I got, is that you h
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Too bad these ISPs don't realize P2P has legitimate uses.
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Apparently, if you're a Comcast customer, your chance of being able to download the torrent are probably very slim. Even though Cogeco is the highest-rated Canadian ISP in terms of resets, the top 20 list contains many different Comcast ISP ID's.