CRTC

Update: Associating Canadian ISPs with Anonymized Data Traffic Submissions

/ Christopher Parsons

200902142238.jpgI’ve just posted a document that draws together the CRTC’s February 4, 11, and 12 filings for PN 2008-19. The document ties ISPs with categories of anonymous data for easy reference, and is also meant to contextualize each data set by reproducing the questions that led ISPs to develop these data sets in the first place.

Items of note:

  • Responses to question 1 (a) show that, save for a single ISP, ISPs’ annual percentage growth of total traffic volume has decreased. ISPs required to anonymously submit data: Barrett, Bell Canada et al., Cogeco, MTS Allstream, QMI (Videotron), Rogers, Sasktel, Shaw, Telus.
  • Responses to question 1 (b) show that the percentage of HTTP/Streaming traffic has increased, two companies report that the percentage of P2P traffic has increased and two report it has decreased slightly, UDP traffic has increased slightly, and the “Other” category now accounts for a smaller percentage of total traffic than in the first months measured. ISPs required to anonymously submit data: Barrett, Bell Canada et al. (for Bell Wireline), Bragg, Rogers, and Shaw.
  • Responses to 2 (a) reveal the annual percentage growth of monthly average usage per end-user. We find that growth is occurring on company networks, and that this growth has been uneven (e.g. Company A experienced 16% growth one year, 47% the next, and 13% in the final year). This suggests, to me, that developing an accurate forecast of expected bandwidth growth would be challenging. Without knowing what companies are associated with each data set, it is challenging for analysts to determine if Network Management Technologies might be responsible for the changes in growth rates. ISPs required to anonymously submit data: Barrett, Bell Canada et al. (for Bell Wireline), Cogeco, MTS Allstream, QMI (Videotron), Rogers, and Telus.
  • Responses to 2 (b) discuss the percentage growth for ISPs’ top 5% and 10% users. Data for the top 5% shows that two companies experienced negative growth in 2007-2008, one only 2% growth in 2007-2008, and the last a 25% growth. Data for the top 10% shows that two companies experienced negative growth in 2007-2008, one 1% growth, and the last a 25% growth. ISPs required to anonymously submit data: Bell Canada et al. (for Bell Wireline), Cogeco, MTS Allstream, QMI (Videotron), Rogers, and Telus.
  • Responses to 2 (c) identify how much of the total traffic that top 5% and 10% users account for. Top 5% account for 37%-56% of total traffic. The top 10% account for 52%-74%. These are fairly damning numbers, given that they clearly demonstrate that massive proportions of the network are being used by a relatively small minority of users. ISPs required to anonymously submit data: Barrett, Bell Canada et al. (for Bell Wireline), Bragg, Cogeco, MTS Allstream, Primus, QMI (Videotron), Rogers, Shaw, and Telus.
  • Responses to 2 (d) break down the application usage numbers for the top 5% and 10% of ISPs’ users. For the top 5% of users, HTTP/Streaming has remained relatively constant, P2P use decreased for only one company, UDP traffic is up, and “Other” traffic has decreased for two of three companies. For the top 10% of users, HTTP/Streaming traffic makes up a higher percentage of total traffic, in all but one case P2P traffic represents a larger percentage of total traffic, UDP is up, and “Other” is down for two of three companies. ISPs required to anonymously submit data: Bell Canada et al. (for Bell Wireline), Bragg, and Shaw.

Update: CRTC PN 2008-19 ISP Filing Summary Document

/ Christopher Parsons

200902132334.jpgI’ve updated my initial ISP Filing Summary document with the information that ISPs provided on February 9, 2008 per the CRTC’s February 4, 2009 request. Updates to the document are made in blue. The updates to not include Videotron’s response to 1 (c).

I would maintain that the most interesting parts of was was released have been summarized in a post from two days ago, which was entitled “Update: CRTC PN 2008-19 Filings“. Tomorrow, I should be posting a document that correlates data the CRTC aggregated and anonymized with the ISPs who were required to release anonymized data. My hope is that this will make it a bit clearer who data might be associated with.

Update: CRTC PN 2008-19 Filings

/ Christopher Parsons

200902122343.jpgI’ve only just now had a chance to start to summarize my thoughts on documents related to CRTC Public Notice (PN) 2008-19; Review of the Internet traffic management practices of Internet service providers that have been filed since January 26th, 2009. Below are points of interest that come up – my hope is in the next few days to integrate and update the initial summary document that I prepared for ISP filings, so that a more complete picture of what has been filed exists.

January 26, 2009 ISP Filings

These filings, by major Canadian ISPs, were in response to the earlier inquiries made by non-ISP interrogatories for the public notice. I put together a summary document concerning those inquiries, and wrote a post that pulled together interesting comments that emerged from them.

Cogeco noted hat it was well known that there was a growth in Internet data traffic, though was not willing to disclose their actual growth numbers. Bell and MTS Allstream both supported the suggestion that the CRTC aggregate raw data traffic information that was provided by ISPs, so long as the information was anonymized and thus kept trade secrets relatively secret. Bell suggested that such aggregations could be divided according to ‘HTTP/streaming’, ‘P2P’, ‘UDP’, and ‘Other’ categories. MTS Allstream suggested that aggregated numbers be divided by ‘Telcos’ and ‘Cable providers’, or by ‘ISPs that throttle’ and ‘ISPs that don’t throttle traffic’.

Continue reading →

Update: Bell Users’ Average Bandwidth Use

/ Christopher Parsons

200902032359.jpgJust a quick note about an interesting tidbit that was passed out by the Bell rep who gave a presentation on DPI today: A few years ago (no precise dates given) users were consuming, on average, 1GB of traffic; this has risen tenfold since that date. As Bell has repeatedly stated in CRTC submissions, they are not caching personally identifiable information as packets course through their DPI equipment, but still maintain that they are looking into the application layer of packets, but not the ‘content’ of the packet. It’s my hope that, over the next few months, more information about ISP uses of DPI emerges so that a more nuanced and productive discussion can take place.

In the next day or so, I’ll be putting up more thoughts and facts that emerged through the 10th annual security and privacy conference, “Life in a Digital Fishbowl“.

Summary: CRTC PN 2008-19; Requests for Public Disclosure Filings

/ Christopher Parsons / 4 Comments

I’ve just completed a summary document that pulls together the requests for disclosure from the various advocacy groups currently involved in the CRTC’s PN 2008-19 (ISP Internet Management Techniques). A few things that I found of interest:

  1. TELUS is being used as a lever against the other ISPs; the common metric is “TELUS released all this information in public, so what justification can the rest of the ISPs have for filing in confidence?”
  2. Public Interest Advocacy Center (PAIC) really focused on Bell and Rogers, and noted repeatedly that Bell has filed items in confidence in this public notice that it had been forced to file in public previously. Also, where Bell could claim confidentiality last time (Canadian Association of Internet Providers [CAIP] v Bell), this isn’t the case now because all the major ISPs will be forced to show their hands at the same time.
  3. Without historical and projected growth, it is impossible for public groups to argue whether or not current managing practices are appropriate. This data needs to be released so that they can fully response to the CRTC’s public notice.
  4. The Campaign for Democratic Media (CDM) is willing to have all of the ISPs’ traffic aggregated, so long as it is disclosed publicly what the trends are.
  5. CDM notes that without information on the top 5% and 10% of users, that it is impossible to ascertain what their actual impact on total bandwidth has been.
  6. CAIP, PAIC, and the Canadian Film and Television Production Association (CFTPA) all argue that it is important for clear, technical, explanations of congestion be provided – without this, it is challenging to effectively interrogate what is, or isn’t, happening on ISPs’ networks.
  7. PIAC stands that, if Bell didn’t have a congestion metric in place prior to January 2007 then they should be obligated to disclose information in public on the basis that their definitions of congestion need to be examined more closely than others (unstated, but this is in part because they are such a major player in Canada).
  8. CFTPA holds that Bell’s networking diagram is good, because it offers specifics into their network. In light of Bell’s submission, other parties should submit similarly detailed diagrams, with devices clearly labeled, so that members of the public can meaningfully comment on whether the network components use by ISPs are adequate or not.
  9. CAIP, CDM, PAIC, and CFTPA all maintain that knowing what products are being used to manage Internet traffic is critical – without this information it is challenging to actually comment on how throttling is occurring. CDM raises the privacy issue with DPI.

Comment: Canadian ISPs and Internet Traffic Management

/ Christopher Parsons / 1 Comment

I’ve recently put up a document that summarized most of the first round of filings for the CRTC’s investigation of Canadian ISP traffic management practices (PN 2008-19), and thought that I’d post a few things that I thought were most interesting (for me). Keep in mind that many of my interests revolve around deep packet inspection.

Network Use Averages

  1. Bell filed their specific data points in confidence, though from what they provided we can see that the top 5% of usage on the network has declined from 61.1% to 46.6%, and the top 10% of network usage has declined from 77.1% to 62.6%.
  2. In TELUS’ case, we find that their retail customers have decreased the amount of content they are uploading, though they are downloading more. Their wholesale customers are both downloading and uploading more than in 2006. Specific traffic data was filed in confidence to the CRTC.
  3. Bell finds that P2P and HTTP/Streaming traffic are the most commonly used end-user categories that contribute to bandwidth usage.

Canadian ISPs Admitting to Traffic Management

  1. Bell Wireline (excludes Bell Mobility and Bell Aliant Atlantic). DPI technology is used, though the vendor and products are filed in confidence.
  2. Cogeco uses DPI, but has filed the vendor and products in confidence.
  3. Rogers filed their comments in confidence, but from past information that has emerged we know that they are using DPI equipment.
  4. Shaw Communications Inc. uses Arbor-Ellacoya devices, though the particular products are filed in confidence.
  5. Barrett Xplore Inc. Uses VoIP prioritization, provisioning of modems, and DPI. Specifics are filed in confidence.
  6. While not explicitly stated, is appears as though Bragg Communications Ltd. also uses DPI.

Canadian ISPs Not Using Traffic Management

  1. MTS Allstream Inc.
  2. SaskTel (though they do use Arbor Peakflow SP, dominantly for network security purposes)
  3. Primus Telecommunications Canada Inc.
  4. Telus

What is Being Filtered/Throttled?

  1. Bell acknowledges that they do throttle traffic between 1630 and 0200 each day by limiting bandwidth available to P2P applications. A detailed listing of applications is not publicly mentioned.
  2. Cogeco currently uses management technologies against: eDonkey/eMule, EmuleEncrypted, Kazaa, Fast Track KaZaA Networking, Napster, Bittorrent, Dijjer, Manolito, Hotline, Share, Soulseek, v-share, Zattoo, Joost, KuGoo, Kuro, DHT, Commercial File Sharing, Baidu Movie, Club Box, Winny, Gnitella, Gnutella Networking, WinMX, Direct Connect, PeerEnabler, Exosee, Further, Filtopia, Mute, NodeZilla, waste, Warez, NeoNet, PPLiveStream Misc, BAIBAO, POCO, Entropy, Rodi, Guruguru, Pando, Soribada, Freenet, PacketiX, Feidian, AntsP@P, Sony Location Free, thunder, Web Thunder. They only look at the specific signature of P2P applications.
  3. Rogers “looks at header information embedded in the payload and session establishment procedures.” What is unclear to me is how they are suggesting that header information is embedded in the payload itself – these are two separate spaces in packets, as I understand networking 101. Specifics P2P that are filtered is not mentioned, though they only concentrate on uploaded content.
  4. Shaw doesn’t say – they’ve filed their findings in confidence.
  5. Barrett doesn’t say – they’ve filed their findings in confidence.
  6. Bragg targets: Bittorrent, News, DirectConnect, Blubster, gnutella, KaZaA, WinMX, eDonkey, Filetopia, Hotline, GuruGuru, Soribada, Soulseek, Ares, JoltID, eMule, Waste, Konspire2b, ExoSee, FurtherNet, MUTE, GNUnet, Nodezilla. Bragg focuses on the packet headers and the behaviour of packet exchanges, and avoiding learning about the content of packet flows.

Under What Conditions Non-Management ISPs Would Manage Their Networks

  1. MTS Allstream notes that only if a capital investment analysis found traffic management technologies to lead to enhanced revenue would they invest in management technologies.
  2. SaskTel has three conditions that would lead them to adopt management technologies: (a) customer demand outstrips capacity and augmentation could not be economically accomplished; (b) if competitive forces require the introduction of alternate service definitions; (c) if there was a need to enforce the aUP so that there was sufficient network capacity for end-users.
  3. TELUS does not currently use management technologies such as DPI, and has no plans to do so.

There is more in the document that is of note, but insofar as it pertains to DPI I thought that these were probably core points that people would be interested in.