This Browser Officially Hijacked
This is what you’ll see when your household exceeds the bandwidth quota allotted by Rogers.
You’ll be sure to see it. Rogers will hijack your browser and show it to you.
And your browser window will wind up looking like this:
But I refused to believe it this morning when it happened to me. What -- over 60 gigs? Just in March? No way. I monitor every last drop of bandwidth percolating through the router. No way.
That’s what I said when I finally got through that crazy voice recognition system of Rogers’. No way.
“Well,” replied their living and breathing tech support fellow, “what does your record show?”
“20 gigs -– give or take a few,” I growled. All indignant.
So we compared daily bandwidth records. And it turned out I was totally wrong. The 20 gigs I’d been looking at? Corresponded with the last 10 days’ use. Only.
“Alright, fine,” I relented. “But how confident are you guys in tracking everyone’s bandwidth? And what will you do when individuals dispute your readings? How will you resolve that?”
“Pretty confident,” he said. “We’ve been testing the hell out of it. Of course, computers do make mistakes. And in such cases, customers self-tracking their bandwidth will stand a good chance of getting credited.”
“Ok, but why do it at all?” I asked. “Didn’t your high-speed customers sign up for unlimited use?”
“We have no choice,” he replied. “We pay for bandwidth and now it’s getting to the point where some customers are using 200 gigs. More even. That’s what’s wrecked it for everyone else.”
Ok. Fair enough. But still. The link provided by Rogers to view one’s bandwidth usage -- rogers.com/keepingpace –- is not accessible. In fact, Rogers’ website has been down all day. How to trust Rogers’ bandwidth tracking everyone –- when Rogers can’t even keep their own website up?
I’ll keep right on self-tracking, thank you. And this whole browser hijacking thing? I’ll have to think about that some more. Because, going by first impressions –- it just seems like some sort of security nightmare. But first, I’m gon’na find out who’s been abusing the torrents @ my household last month. That’s one mystery won’t require much brilliance detecting.
[Peter Fruchter teaches in the Division of Humanities at York University.]
p.s.: Are there any decent providers left -- or is the whole virtual universe getting chocked by Bell "traffic shaping"? Anyone know -- Carolyn, Richard?
posted by quasimodal | 12:09:00 PM
11 Comments on "This Browser Officially Hijacked":
Check out Primus. They're always a little cheaper and friendlier to the little guy. Any idea about satellite connections these days?
I use Rogers too. I have the supra ultra bandwidth excessive plan which has 100GBs per month - because my old roommate was a BT hog. It's only 3$/month more than what you probably have.. so you might look into that.
I've found a good thing to say about them - one: when I moved last week, the internet worked in the morning at the old place, and 3 hours later worked (perfectly) in the new place. That is a first.
Rogers traffic shapes and Bell traffic shapes. If Primus and all the other smaller ISPs are merely renting the Bell/Rogers network, what's the likelihood that it isn't also traffic shaping, either to keep their costs down, or because the ISP they are renting it from is doing it on their behalf? Pretty low, I would think.
BTW, from Express to Extreme is now a $10 difference, but with a 95 GB limit instead of 60 GB. And for people with money to burn, there's also the Extreme Plus service @ $99.95 per month with a 18 Mbps download speed, but strangely enough, still a 95 GB cap.
- frank
Oh, come on, Peter: "How to trust Rogers’ bandwidth tracking everyone –- when Rogers can’t even keep their own website up?" (1) Rogers is large, and there are different people doing those two things. (2) Few things run 100% of the time -- if a system is down that hardly implies inaccuracy, and if anything it might fail to count some of your usage, which would be in your favour.
I don't recommend satellite connections unless you live in a rural area and have no other choice. The time is takes a radio signal to reach geosynchronous orbit and come back is about half a second. Round trip is about a whole second. This wrecks many interactive experiences.
I doubt that traffic shaping will go away until, and if, the Internet protocols are modified to prevent people from hogging the network. That isn't likely any time soon, now that the Internet is no longer controlled by one organization. So get used to paying for high traffic, throttling, etc. There is one bright spot in that Verizon in the USA is now working to optimize BitTorrent traffic. Note that they use DSL and fibre-to-the-home -- cable operators, by contrast, are less likely to do such things because the standard IP-over-cable system is designed for relatively low upstream bandwidth.
Thanks for all the great info.
Rohan, you are right that website crashing suggests little or nothing about bandwidth tracking accuracy. I do have other reasons for doubting Rogers' -- which all together probably account for my bias.
Carolyn, I'm curious whether your cost per bandwidth will get grandfathered -- or whether Rogers will re-price your bandwidth as per their new deal.
And while all you techie sophisticates are still here -- what if, let's say, I use up astronomic bandwidth. But it's all via peer-to-peer wireless networking. Should that not be exempt from getting tracked/charged for by providers?
Yes, I know there's lots of possible permutations to this -- leaving it fully general to see what you guys say.
My $.02 worth
last I heard, Bell's practice for prioritizing traffic is being done at the infrastructure level not at the ISP level. At the ISP level there may be further QoS tricks.
What does all of this mean?
All DSL based ISP services in Ontario and Quebec travel over the Bell Nexia network. Nexia is the infrastructure level. So if you choose Primus, TekSavvy or any of the smaller ISP you will still be affected by traffic shaping. Though not to the same extent as Rogers or Sympatico.
I have Primus at both home and office, and have some client who are very happy with the connection. In fact they are more pleased with the Primus connection then with the Telus one they used in the past.
Peter, if you really want to measure the bandwidth usage of your connection, let me know. I have a few toys you can borrow.
-rd-
Thanks Richard, I may take you up on that. Right now I'm using third party router software called Tomato. Not documented but totally enhances my Linksys router.
Despite absolute ignorance, I find this whole "infrastructural" traffic shaping development fascinating. It seems to suggest data packets are becoming increasingly organic -- as if dressed up in protein coats, membranes, etc. Does this mean data routing will increasingly come to resemble biological immune systems and responses? Will there eventually be data-plagues -- rather than just viral infections?
ISP's like Primus complaining about Bell's traffic shaping:
http://www.itworldcanada.com/Pages/Docbase/ViewArticle.aspx?ID=idgml-59843907-fe6b-4c0a-9bcb-88440f1cf690&ql=088980
Bell's response:
http://www.itworldcanada.com/Pages/Docbase/ViewArticle.aspx?ID=idgml-dc53f871-facf-4128-98f3-d6d403d458b9&ql=083808
Summary:
ISPs - We paid for that bandwidth, so Bell shouldn't be shaping the traffic.
Bell - The agreement you signed allows us to shape traffic for "the benefit of all". If you don't like it, build you own network.
Thanks Frank -- useful articles.
So, in that second article, Bell's Mirko Biblic blames -- demonizes? -- peer-to-peers almost word-for-word like the Roger's fellow I spoke to:
"People need to keep in mind that 95 per cent of Internet users do not use peer-to-peer services. If you think about it, the hostages are the 95 per cent of users whose service gets deteriorated, whose speed gets constrained by those who consume tons of bandwidth. We feel we have an obligation to ensure the 95 per cent of users aren’t held hostage like this."
What I'm curious about is this: might peer-to-peer networking ultimately get used to defeat traffic shaping -- or otherwise modifying -- interference? Could peer-to-peer intranet networking help avoid ISPs altogether? Or is that notion just silly?
From what I've read, the traffic shaping is usually done against ports normally associated with P2P traffic. The workaround has been to encrypt your traffic via some sort of low cost VPN solution. And perhaps that's why Rogers is going with traffic caps, as that's something that is much easier to track.
Maybe I'm not creative enough, but I can't imagine a P2P solution that would leave the ISPs out of the picture. That traffic still needs a network infrastructure to run on. Even if I setup a WiFi network with friends and well wishers, in the end, someone needs to have that last leg to the internet, and more importantly, someone needs to recover the costs for that circuit.
http://www.cata.ca/caip/
CAIP Responds to Bell's Anti Competitive Behaviour: Requests application of CRTC regulations to end customer throttling
April 28, 2008 - Ottawa, ON - Canada's largest Internet association has submitted its reply to Bell Canada's response to a regulatory complaint filed with the CRTC by the Canadian Association of Internet Providers (CAIP). CAIP's reply states that Bell's response confirms that the association's arguments of wrong-doing by the country's largest phone company in what has become known as "traffic shaping" or "throttling" were well-founded.
CAIP's original Part VII Application was filed earlier this month in response to certain "traffic shaping" measures that Bell Canada is applying to local access and transport services it supplies to competitors on a regulated basis. Independent competitors interconnect with Bell in order to gain access to their end-user through the "final mile" of access on Bell's local network. Competitors deliver their own services, including Internet access, VoIP, VPN, etc., over this regulated facility.
Bell has admitted that it is "throttling" traffic between the ISP and end user for ten hours each day. Canada's other major phone companies have publicly stated they do not shape the traffic of their competitive wholesale clients.
Tom Copeland, Chair of CAIP, said "In our reply we have further demonstrated to the CRTC that Bell's activity is counter to regulations Bell is obliged to follow under the Telecommunication Act and that the anti-competitive action is having a negative impact on our members and our customers".
Bell executives have maintained that they are throttling, or impeding, only peer-to-peer (P2P) traffic but tests by CAIP's members and Internet users at large have upheld CAIP's argument that other forms of traffic, including VoIP and VPNs, have become collateral damage. This presents significant reliability issues for many Canadian businesses.
CAIP has noted that coincident with when the traffic shaping began, Bell had announced its retail "unlimited" Internet accounts would be discontinued in favour of usage-based billing. Bell has also undertaken a marketing program advertising its residential high-speed service as a "direct, uncongested gateway to the Internet" using a "new, next-generation fibre optic network" with "consistent, super-fast access speeds".
"If Bell can advertise their service in this manner, while at the same time claiming to suffer from bandwidth congestion, then clearly there is a conflict between their traffic shaping action and reality. We hope the CRTC agrees with the evidence we have presented and returns the market to the state it was at prior to Bell's implementation of traffic shaping," says Mr. Copeland.
"This matter is now squarely in front of the CRTC. The industry is appalled by Bell's actions. Canadian Internet users are outraged and Canadian businesses are being negatively impacted," concludes Mr. Copeland.
Formed in 1996, CAIP's Mission is to foster the growth of a healthy and competitive Internet industry in Canada.
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CAIP, a Division of CATAAlliance: CAIP (Canadian Association of Internet Providers) represents internet service providers across Canada with a mandate of fostering the growth of a healthy and competitive Internet service industry in Canada through collective and cooperative action on Canadian and international issues of mutual interest.
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And another country's activists sound off:
Hold Off On Net Neutrality
By David Farber and Michael Katz
Friday, January 19, 2007
The Internet needs a makeover. Unfortunately, congressional initiatives aimed at preserving the best of the old Internet threaten to stifle the emergence of the new one.
The current Internet supports many popular and valuable services. But experts agree that an updated Internet could offer a wide range of new and improved services, including better security against viruses, worms, denial-of-service attacks and zombie computers; services that require high levels of reliability, such as medical monitoring; and those that cannot tolerate network delays, such as voice and streaming video. To provide these services, both the architecture of the Internet and the business models through which services are delivered will probably have to change.
Congress failed to pass legislation amid rancorous debate last summer, but last week a group of senators reintroduced several initiatives under the banner of "network neutrality."
Network neutrality is supposed to promote continuing Internet innovation by restricting the ability of network owners to give certain traffic priority based on the content or application being carried or on the sender's willingness to pay. The problem is that these restrictions would prohibit practices that could increase the value of the Internet for customers.
Traffic management is a prime example. When traffic surges beyond the ability of the network to carry it, something is going to be delayed. When choosing what gets delayed, it makes sense to allow a network to favor traffic from, say, a patient's heart monitor over traffic delivering a music download. It also makes sense to allow network operators to restrict traffic that is downright harmful, such as viruses, worms and spam.
Pricing raises similar issues. To date, Internet pricing has been relatively simple. Based on experience in similar markets, we expect that, if left alone, pricing and service models will probably evolve. For example, new services with guaranteed delivery quality might emerge to support applications such as medical monitoring that require higher levels of reliability than the current Internet can guarantee. Suppliers could be expected to charge higher prices for these premium services.
Blocking premium pricing in the name of neutrality might have the unintended effect of blocking the premium services from which customers would benefit. No one would propose that the U.S. Postal Service be prohibited from offering Express Mail because a "fast lane" mail service is "undemocratic." Yet some current proposals would do exactly this for Internet services.
We're not saying that all discrimination is good or that the market always gets it right. Some forms of discrimination can be harmful, especially when service providers have market power. For example, if a local telephone company that is a monopoly provider of both broadband access and plain old telephone service for a community blocks its broadband subscribers from using an Internet phone service offered by a rival company, this discrimination can harm both competition and consumers.
Public policy should intervene where anti-competitive actions can be identified and the cure will not be worse than the disease. Policymakers must tread carefully, however, because it can be difficult, if not impossible, to determine in advance whether a particular practice promotes or harms competition. Antitrust law generally takes a case-by-case approach under which private parties or public agencies can challenge business practices and the courts require proof of harm to competition before declaring a practice illegal. This is a sound approach that has served our economy well.
The legislative proposals debated in the 109th Congress take a very different approach. They would impose far-reaching prohibitions affecting all broadband providers, regardless of whether they wielded monopoly power and without any analysis of whether the challenged practice actually harmed competition. If enacted, these proposals would threaten to restrict a wide range of innovative services without providing any compensating customer benefits.
Does this mean we believe that we should place all our trust in the market and the current providers? No. But it does mean we should wait until there is a problem before rushing to enact solutions.
David Farber is distinguished career professor of computer science and public policy at Carnegie Mellon University. Michael L. Katz is a professor of economics at the University of California at Berkeley. Gerald Faulhaber, a professor at the Wharton School and the University of Pennsylvania's law school, and Christopher S. Yoo, a law professor at Vanderbilt University, also contributed to this article.
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