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Packet Juggling - Floating Data Storage

Posted by Hemos on from the utility-computing dept.

Filthmaster writes "I just saw an interesting paper that has been posted to bugtraq, full-disclosure and vulnwatch. It deals with the principles of stealthily using network infrastructure as either short-term or long-term storage. Not sure if I'm ready to implement it, but it makes interesting food for thought." There's also a mirror up.

6 of 148 comments (clear)

  1. If this were quick enough by Amiga+Lover · · Score: 5, Interesting

    If it were quick enough and timed well enough, could network bounced packets be enough for some really quick swapped out swap space? gig ethernet gets around 1ms to my next machine, and thats 10 times quicker than my hard drive (10ms access time) so if I could store swap in that space, would that work?

    I was thinking of tunneling ssh over sms before this, but that sounds just silly now.

  2. Re:Bandwidth? by Zocalo · · Score: 5, Funny
    Ah, but in this context that could be a good thing since a slower Internet = more latency = longer TTL on your data. Take the ping for example; if it takes twice as long for your ping to echo back with your data, then you only need to retransmit back to storage at half the rate.

    I wasn't trying DoS the Internet your honour... I was trying to improve data retention times! ;)

    --
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  3. Provisioned storage within the Internet by FastDownload · · Score: 5, Informative

    While the authors try to use existing protocols to simulate temporary storage in the Internet, we are working on a scalable, shared storage resource that is open to the community.

    We currently have over 20 TB of storage around the world available in the public Logistical Networking Testbed and other groups have another 10-20 TB provisioned in private use testbeds.

    In additon to storage, we are also working on providing simple computational services at the storage nodes (work on the data in place while it is stored rather than moving it to computation centers).

    For more info, visit the LoCI Lab at http://loci.cs.utk.edu.

    --
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  4. Reminds us of the old days... by ControlFreal · · Score: 5, Interesting

    ... in which complete computer memories worked like this: those were called mercury delay line memories, in which pressure waves in mercury lines basically held information.

    The UNIVAC I had such an 18-channel memory. More information can be found here, here, and here.

    These channels could hold a whopping kilobit!

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  5. You don't need the Internet to do this by melonman · · Score: 5, Funny

    Just burn a CD a day and post it to a non-existant address on the other side of the world. That way you can probably keep a terabyte of data int he air without taking any space in your office, and, unlike TCP/IP, you may be able to reuse the wrappers.

    --
    Virtually serving coffee
  6. Main problem with this is... by zen+parse · · Score: 5, Informative

    Not everyone can benefit, because of side effects of it's parasitic nature.

    The amount of storage this system gives in the text would be total available for ALL users of the system. More users, less avaiable storage.

    Parasites can do better when there little competition from other parasites, but if the system get's infested, the host it lives of may die. Or someone may develop a cure.

    Either way, after a certain threshold, the more popular any system using this gets, the less useful it would be.

    Just some random thoughts I had when I was talking about a similar idea with someone.