At least it doesn’t hesitate or try to hide the fact like Comcast, but it still raises troubling questions.
I mentioned a few days ago about how Cox Communications’ subscribers are complaining about inconsistent upload speeds that in some cases rarely come close to established maximum speeds.
Robb Topolski, who was the first to discover Comcast’s BitTorrent throttling efforts, was asked to investigate the claims. He soon discovered that Cox is "…using traffic shaping hardware to send forged TCP/IP packets with the RST (reset) flag set — with the goal of disrupting eDonkey traffic." He said the technique is similar to what Comcast has using with BitTorrent traffic, but so far he’s unable to tell precisely what hardware Cox is using.
Much to their credit, Cox confirmed the practice later that day via a response from David Deliman, Product Communications Manager:
It reads:
To ensure the best possible online experience for our customers, Cox actively manages network traffic through a variety of methods including traffic prioritization and protocol filtering. Cox does not prohibit the use of file-sharing services for uploads or downloads, or discriminate against any specific services in any way. To help our customers make the most out of their Internet experience, we take proactive measures to ensure that bandwidth intensive applications do not negatively impact their service. These network management practices are outlined in our subscriber agreement and Acceptable Use Policy.
At least Cox was far more straightforward about their P2P throttling than Comcast has ever been, but it does signal a troubling new trend in which an increasing number of ISPs are choking off file-sharing bandwidth to save themselves money. What I don’t understand is that if a company advertises X amount of bandwidth for say $40 bucks a month, why are customers then being penalized for merely taking full advantage of what they are technically entitled to?
I don’t use eDonkey, but I’m a Cox subscriber that luckily hasn’t noticed any P2P throttling yet, and I hope I never do. But, it does make me wonder who’ll be next in their file-sharing crackdown if they do decide to free up more network bandwidth. With recent news that a Comcast subscriber has decided to sue the ISP for throttling his BitTorrent traffic, hopefully I won’t have to worry about it anytime soon.
Looking for more stuff to watch or download?
Tips on how to not get busted for file-sharing
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uTorrent – A Beginner’s guide to BitTorrent downloading
News Tip? Comment? Suggestion? jared@zeropaid.com
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- Cox Throttling eDonkey Upload Speeds?
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They should be sued. Buncha bastards. I mean I don’t wanna be in a restaurant and order a steak… then them charge me for a full stake and bring me half… then them be like.. Oh well it’s crowded in here tonight and other people are hungry too. You understand don’t you? I mean why would the company want to give them what the customers pay instead of just fucking everyone?
YeahI think this will be a court battle for sure.
Comcast and other may say they are only trying to save bandwith but if they do not provide the service they promised they could get in legal trouble.
Hey ISP’s….here is a CLUE…..either STOP with your claims about unlimited service and download and upload as much as you want at the “fastest speeds possible”….or get your pants sued off in court……your choice.
I havent noticed any throttling with any torrents up or down. I never had comcast but I recieved enough calls getting cussed to be glad its not here. Even without the throttling issue they get a bad name.
how can they explain that’s not discrimination?
from 1/9/09 to now 5/19/09 i’ve noticed that cox does indeed throttle my bandwidth when using utorrent
i also noticed that if you leave u torrent running for long periods of time they permanently throttle your bandwidth for like a month or so
I read about this after just getting the cox service and tested it out not knowing what p2p would be like with this.
It would connect for like 10 seconds at around 200k then drop for about 10 seconds to 0. It went back and forth on a 155meg file like this but still downloaded.
If an isp has an issue with high usage, they should have some soft caps on the bandwidth usage and not attack certain uses of bandwidth. So if one user is using like 500gig a month, maybe a notice of please use less would be better.