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First Detailed Data Analysis Shows Exactly How Comcast Jammed Netflix

Posted by timothy on from the is-there-a-market-for-non-discrimination? dept.

An anonymous reader writes John Oliver calls it "cable company f*ckery" and we've all suspected it happens. Now on Steven Levy's new Backchannel publication on Medium, Susan Crawford delivers decisive proof, expertly dissecting the Comcast-Netflix network congestion controversy. Her source material is a detailed traffic measurement report (.pdf) released this week by Google-backed M-Lab — the first of its kind — showing severe degradation of service at interconnection points between Comcast, Verizon and other monopoly "eyeball networks" and "transit networks" such as Cogent, which was contracted by Netflix to deliver its bits. The report shows that interconnection points give monopoly ISPs all the leverage they need to discriminate against companies like Netflix, which compete with them in video services, simply by refusing to relieve network congestion caused by external traffic requested by their very own ISP customers. And the effects victimize not only companies targeted but ALL incoming traffic from the affected transit network. The report proves the problem is not technical, but rather a result of business decisions. This is not technically a Net neutrality problem, but it creates the very same headaches for consumers, and unfair business advantages for ISPs. In an accompanying article, Crawford makes a compelling case for FCC intervention.

15 of 243 comments (clear)

  1. Sigh... by MightyMartian · · Score: 5, Insightful

    "In an accompanying article, Crawford makes a compelling case for FCC intervention."

    That won't work unless it comes with a check with seven digits attached to it.

    --
    The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
    1. Re:Sigh... by Em+Adespoton · · Score: 5, Insightful

      And that won't really work because an even larger check from the cable companies will always follow. Hell they most likely just give them a credit card with an unlimited balance that draws right from the cable companies' customers' bank accounts.

      FTFY

  2. Common Carrier by Anon-Admin · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Once again, a call for net neutrality will ensue. All we really need is for the FCC to call them Common Carriers and apply the age old law.

    It has already been applied to Telecoms and Utilities, just apply it to the ISP's and be done with this crap.

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/C...

    1. Re:Common Carrier by Jason+Levine · · Score: 5, Insightful

      It's more like Phone Company A has 100 channels to Phone Company B. They notice that there is a constant level of 99 calls between A and B. They also see that 25 calls are constantly being made to Joe's Pizzeria who uses Phone Company B for phone service. Phone Company A gets upset that Joe's isn't paying them (Phone Company A) for this traffic, so they refuse to add more channels. (Even though doing so would be inexpensive to do.) So calls to Joe's Pizzeria begin being dropped and Joe's customers get mad that they can't get through. Joe's finally signs an agreement with Phone Company A paying them money and suddenly the calls go through just fine.

      This is extortion plain and simple. Add in the fact that the ISPs doing this have an Internet monopoly/duopoly in their areas and also tend to provide video services - that Netflix competes against - and you have extortion plus the use of a monopoly to crush competition in another market. This deserves swift and severe action to show the ISPs that this is NOT to be tolerated. Unfortunately, at best we'll get a strongly worded statement and perhaps a fine that Comcast will make back in the time it took me to write this comment.

      --
      My sci-fi novel, Ghost Thief, is now available from Amazon.com.
  3. WHy net neutrality doesn't work by lgw · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Stuff like this is why I think Net Neutrality discussions miss the mark - you're not going to fix the problem that way, you're only going to cause the cable companies to achieve the same throttling through other technical means. Trying to close technical loopholes via the lawmaking process requires a body of law the size of the tax code.

    The fundamental problem is that companies with a legally-granted monopoly for delivering high-speed internet are also allowed to sell content. In a free market, that wouldn't bother me - competition would sort it all out. But "last mile" is about as far from a free market as you can get in most of the country these days, and so we get this as a result.

    Last mile needs to become a public utility. Let vendors compete for my business, and I'll pick "just a pipe" or a content company or whatever mix fits my needs.

    --
    Socialism: a lie told by totalitarians and believed by fools.
    1. Re:WHy net neutrality doesn't work by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

      "Last mile needs to become a public utility. Let vendors compete for my business, and I'll pick "just a pipe" or a content company or whatever mix fits my needs."

      I think you have that backward.

      The backbone should be a public utility. The gov't should assume the responsibility for the massive infrastructure required to build the backbone. Then its easy for any small mom/pop ISP to connect to the public backbone for a nominal fee and provide last mile service to their area when they are unhappy with the current last mile providers as it requires orders of magnitude smaller investments in infrastructure.

      Slashdot required car analogy, The Fed Gov't built the interstate system, the local gov't built/maintains the local roads and all the mom/pop stores are welcome to build brick n mortar business and connect to those roads for nominal fees. Meanwhile private parties are also welcome to build special roads/infrastructure at there own cost to serve special needs, and the public is sometimes welcome to use those items at additional cost EG: Toll roads/bridges/tunnels/ferries

    2. Re:WHy net neutrality doesn't work by nine-times · · Score: 4, Insightful

      The fundamental problem is that companies with a legally-granted monopoly for delivering high-speed internet are also allowed to sell content.

      I agree with this part of your post, at least, and have been making the same argument for years. If the companies providing the infrastructure were not making money from selling content, and were only serving as "dumb pipes", then their business incentive would be in pushing customers toward higher-bandwidth (and therefore more expensive) connections. In that business model, companies that can provide content to saturate slow connections become very important, and so it seems likely that they would be falling all over themselves to provide a better connection to Netflix.

      Instead, the Infrastructure providers have no incentive to increase content availability, because any piece of available content becomes competition for the content that they are trying to sell. That's a bad system. Unless you have an effective regulatory system, the ISPs will find ways to push towards a walled garden AOL-style internet, charging for access outside of the walled garden.

      However, I don't think this is an example of "net neutrality" missing the mark. Net neutrality is a concept, and divorcing infrastructure providers from content providers is one way in which net neutrality could be promoted.

  4. Re:Netflix, in the parlor, with the fireplace poke by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Yeah, I'm sure netflix just goes around dumping truckloads of data on the information superhighway just at random, and picked on Comcast like a bully.

    Oh wait, every one of those streams were requested from users of Comcast's network who thought that those awesome 150mbit internet speeds comcast advertised were real.

  5. Re:How many engineers does it take to screw netfli by MozeeToby · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Engineer - "Hey Boss, we need some cash to upgrade the connection to these networks."
    Boss - "What?! We just upgraded those connections a couple years ago"
    Engineer - *rolls eyes* "Well the link is saturated, looks like lots of people watching online video... Netflix comes in over this connection so it makes sense"
    Boss - "First they take our subscribers now they're forcing us to upgrade our equipment... well fuck em!"
    Engineer - "Waaah?"
    Boss - "You heard me, fuck em!"
    Engineer - "But... our customers will get terrible service when they try to watch Netflix, or do anything else on that network for that matter"
    Boss - "Exactly!"

  6. Re:Yes it is a peering problem ... by PPH · · Score: 2, Insightful

    When one peer is pushing a lot more traffic onto the other network,

    Simple fix: A Netflix client that echos the content back to the source server.

    Problem fixed.

    --
    Have gnu, will travel.
  7. Re:Yes it is a peering problem ... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    When one peer is pushing a lot more traffic onto the other network, then that usually goes out the window and the pusher is required to pay the receiving network.

    They're not pushing the traffic - the other network is pulling it. Netflix's traffic is not unsolicited - every goddamned packet is being sent in response to a specific request from the other network's customers, and it's not fucking transit - the Netflix packets will terminate within the receiving network. Are you seriously arguing that Comcast should be paid by Netflix because they're carrying gigabytes of Netflix traffic their own fucking customers requested?

  8. Re:Yes it is a peering problem ... by waldozer · · Score: 3, Insightful

    I think you have it backwards. Netflix does not "push data" to Comcast. Comcast customers "pull data from Netflix".

  9. Re: Multiple CDN contracts? by killfixx · · Score: 5, Insightful

    This is a very salient point. Netflix already has these arrangements with other ISPs. Only Comcast, AT&T, and Verizon (surprise surprise) refused to host local caching servers. Of course, this precedes their demands for more money because, "Waaaahhhh...they're stealing our customers, they need to pay!".

    Netflix tried to be the better entity (within reason) and were told, in no uncertain terms, "Go fuck yourself."

    Yay, free market!

    *sigh*

    --
    "Helping to keep you two steps ahead of the Thought Police!"
  10. Re:How many engineers does it take to screw netfli by torkus · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Actually netflix offered to foot the bill for upgrading the bandwidth - it's literally a couple cross-connects in a datacenter, maybe a fiber card or two.

    Oh, and netflix ALSO offers to drop a server in your datacenter *free* which caches all the common netflix streams. This reduces the internet bandwidth demands by something like 90+% since it lives within the ISP's datacenter and just needs to download each stream once.

    But the last line is exactly the point. The ISPs are also TV providers and they don't want you to have a good netflix experience. If they can passively let that happen...well of course they will. No one can accuse them of taking any action to damage your netflix streaming...it's their complete inaction that's resulting in it.

    --
    You can get rich if you own a politician, but you have to be rich to buy one in the first place.
  11. Re: Their answer to oversubscription as well by GigaplexNZ · · Score: 3, Insightful

    The problem is that the backbone provider they chose sends way more traffic than they accept.

    And consumer ISPs give asymmetric speeds most of the time with EULAs that forbid running servers. It's pretty obvious that they'll accept more data than they send by design, so it's unreasonable for their peering agreements to assume symmetric transfers.