Bell Canada's confidential network data reveals that P2P congestion isn't really a problem
Bell Canada has been forced by the CRTC (Canadian telco regulator) to reveal exactly how congested its network is. This follows revelations that Bell has been slowing down P2P traffic -- even traffic on its wholesale customers' networks, so no matter who you buy your DSL from, Bel gets to ruin your P2P experience.
The confidential documents show that, basically, Bell just doesn't have a substantial congestion problem -- in fact, backbone congestion has been going down.
The Canadian Radio-television Telecommunications Commission (CRTC) is currently investigating Bell's system, which cap throttles P2P downloads at around 30KB/s between 4:30pm and 2:00am every day. Bell's own congestion numbers, which the CRTC said must be made public and Bell has now provided to Ars Technica, show that as the DPI gear was more widely deployed across Bell's network and eventually applied to Bell's wholesale customers (who promptly filed a complaint with the CRTC), rates of congestion at the DSLAM level increased. Between March 2007 and September 2007, the number of congested DSLAM links on Bell's network averaged 4.8 percent; during the period from November 2007 to May 2008, that average increased to 6.7 percent.Meanwhile, upstream in Bell's network, congestion has been dropping. Over the same time periods, the average number of congested backbone links fell from 2.9 percent to 1.1 percent.
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so what's their scam?
Make you think your internet is too slow so you upgrade to more expensive service? Add a "Network Improvement Surcharge" to your bill? Beg for subsidies because the network's in "danger" of collapsing?
My ISP is a Bell reseller. I usually get decent burst speeds, but all my downloads, even non-P2P stuff, have been very slow for the past few months. Even Youtube has gotten slower. It's ridiculous.
Screw 'em all. Let's make our own internet.
Well, those numbers may indicate a real problem. Close to 5% of links congested may be a pretty high percentage. Or it may not. What exactly do they mean by "congested link"? If that's percentage of links that're at 75% or more of capacity for extended periods, 5% is a frighteningly high number. OTOH if that's percentage of links that went above 75% of capacity at any point in a given 24-hour period, even if only for a moment, then 5% is exceptionally low. And in terms of one customer affecting another, the DSLAM links don't much matter since those aren't shared. It's the aggregation, BAS and backbone links that matter, they're the ones that're shared between customers.
Bell Canada is claiming the right, on a publicly-funded network, to transmit only those packets it approves of and to intercept those packets it doesn't approve of.
As a result, they are throttling p2p traffic while at the same time opening their own (necessarily bandwidth hungry) online video store.
The important questions here are 1.) what type of links are "congested", and 2.) why hasn't Bell Canada fixed or upgraded them?
Bell Canada continues to withhold this information from the public.
@Todd Knarr: but normally the access link for the DSLAM is the "weakest link" in the network. No all of them have fiber or DS3 connections to the backbone. Maybe that was what you were referring to and I got it all wrong.
It's not just P2P being throttled. DCC transfers and Secure FTP transfers are also being slowed to a crawl.
"It's not just P2P being throttled. DCC transfers and Secure FTP transfers are also being slowed to a crawl."
VPN seems slowed too, though that's just a subjective observation.
Is it a side-effect?
VPN seems slowed too, though that's just a subjective observation.
Is it a side-effect?
If they're choking all encrypted connections (like Secure FTP, SSH, and VPN), then probably. Rogers did this too. They started out just slowing down torrents. The people using the torrents enabled encryption which made it tougher to detect. So Rogers started throttling all encrypted connections. And now Bell does it too. And they do it to other DSL providers that have to use Bell's lines.
Everybody is moving out of Bell anyway (those arrogant bastardos).
@#5: I'm figuring that the links from the DSLAMs to the ISP's internal backbone (or back to the CO in the case of remote boxes) are the "aggregation" links immediately above the DSLAM links. And those show a markedly lower percentage of congestion even though there'd be fewer of them handling more traffic than any individual DSLAM link.
So is there a way to make encrypted traffic appear to be (perhaps unintelligible) unencrypted traffic?
Industry minister even calls on Bell, Telus to explain new text charges-
This is not even a new issue but an old one. I firstly could not help but notice that a very significant AMOUNT OF YOUNG PEOPLE USE THE iPHONES AND COMPUTERS STILL, and that as a direct result we now have whole generation of users who clearly do strongly hate the federal government as well as the big corporations for allowing them to be abused again and again. A really Smart move?? for the Conservatives and big Corporations getting young customers too mad at them now even for life. Certainly not a good, or a great marketing practice for the Conservatives, the Corporations, even for Industry Minister Jim Prentice MP. The whole fiasco, poor past responses, inactions now still being poorly thought out ironically applies now even to to the Conservatives and the Industry Minister himself now as well.. It all clearly falls in the same category as the Conservative Stockwell Day MP and his past skidoo antics.
"Finally Industry Minister Jim Prentice is calling on the chief executive officers of Bell and Telus to meet with him and explain their decision to charge consumers for incoming text messages. Jim Prentice has sent letters to the heads of the two companies, has said the decision to charge consumers without text bundling packages will hurt consumers. The companies must meet with him before Aug. 8. "While I have no desire to interfere with the day-to-day business decisions of two private companies, I do have a duty as minister of industry to protect the interests of the consuming public when necessary," Prentice said in a statement. "I believe this was a poorly thought out decision." Under the Corporations new plans, customers will be charged 15 cents for each incoming text message, including uninvited spam messages. Previously, customers without text plans were only charged for outgoing messages. Customers with a text messaging rate plan or bundle will not be affected by the new charges."
Hey let me shout it all to you again and again, as a taxpayer I too always do openly rightfully expect always a good government, and I rightfully expect the government to do it's job, including all of it's ministers, and I rightfully also expect them always to fully to protect the citizens from the Corporations false misleading advertising, price gouging, price fixing, price collusions, bait and switch approach sales marketing approach, and a lot more. The problem also with the industry minister acting now on the iphone text issue while better late than never, is that the same major ISPs have used the same immoral approach on their Internet services as well and to date nothing was , is being done still about that wrongfully. and this is also still unacceptable.
It is also still interesting how much of the negative complaints rightfully are even coming from Alberta even from the Industries Minister's own riding, Province too, right from the heart of Conservative supporter country.
http://www.cbc.ca/canada/calgary/story/2008/07/09/ndp-messaging.html?ref=rss&loomia_si=t0:a16:g2:r5:c0.0764563#articlecomments
Here again is how many Canadian consuemrs, citizens do see it as far as the iphones mainly. "Only the person who sends the message should be charged plain and simple. Why should I pay because some spammer sent me a text message that I did not want to receive. If I don't want to answer my phone, I can simply ignore a call, but a text message from a number I don't recognize is delivered to my phone whether I want it to be or not."
"Don't think for one minute that hasn't been their plan all along - announce it at a high rate, with the intent of "backing off" to a lower rate...and then slowly increase that rate over the next few years once there's a general acceptance of the practice "
"I am loathe to trust a company that changes the terms of my agreement mid-contract. I would like to learn how it is that they are allowed to do this, but if I would like to change the particulars of my contract mid agreement, it is not allowed. I would like to think that if the terms are changed, shouldn't the principal agreement holder be notified of the changes, otherwise it be nullified?"
"Pay twice for one service..... I'll charge a fee to them for writing a cheque to pay my bill"
"Clearly it is in the best interest of consumers for their elected representatives to voice their concerns on top of those of the consumers when Canadians are being gouged at almost every turn. Bell and Telus clearly to not have the best interests of their customers in mind, rather as always, they are motivated by greed and profit. "
"Kudo's to the NDP on this one!!"