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earlier this week, the M-Lab research consortium has published a report on how data moves through the bowels of our Internet infrastructure. It focused on the points of interconnection, shared facilities nodes where the different networks exchange data so that it can move in the world and in your home. What it showed is that trade disputes - between ISPs transit like Cogent and Level, which carry data across the world, and access ISPs such as Verizon and Comcast, which are the last mile of your home - had a dramatic effect on the ability of many consumers and American businesses to access the Internet, reducing the flow of data to the point where even basic tasks like email would be slow or impossible.
The same data means provides evidence for two opposing conclusions
This was an important new study that showed how strained infrastructure underpins our Internet. But depending on which side of the business dispute you sit on, the data showed two very different things. For ISPs defenders, the data were clear evidence that Netflix was to blame for the degradation of service. For opponents ISPs, data were clear evidence that Comcast and Verizon have tried to punish Netflix, and harm others in the process. But as the author of the M-Lab study argues, this argument is heated causing them to miss the forest for the trees. "What is more important, and more disturbing is the widespread and continuous capacity problems at many points of interconnections that have nothing to do with Netflix," said Collin Anderson, a researcher at M- Lab.
If the congestion was isolated to a single interconnection between a transit and ISP access, it would be possible to lay the blame on Netflix or Comcast to allow things to deteriorate so that they negotiated the price of a direct interconnection. But the M-Lab study found that "these issues can not be laid at the feet of any ISP access, or any ISP Transit: no access ISP performs poorly on all ISPs transit, and any ISP transit performs poorly for all Internet service providers. Therefore, if the problem is less at one end, and not the other, it must be in the middle around the interconnection between the two. "As companies move our data haggle over who should foot the bill for the amount explosion of Internet traffic, our most vital modern utility can become almost inaccessible to consumers.
Our most vital communication utility can become almost inaccessible to consumers
the report found problems follow a predictable pattern, one that is without also surprise in the center of the dispute Netflix with ISPs. "degradation observed performance was almost always daytime, so that the performance for clients to an ISP was significantly worse during peak hours of use, defined by Federal Communications Commission (FCC) that the hours between 19 hours and 23 hours, local time. This allows us to conclude that the congestion and underfunding were the determining factors in the symptoms of degradation observed. "We rely more and more on the internet for our evening entertainment, and that's where the real problems arise. C is Netflix, but Hulu, YouTube, Twitch, and millions of other services. with cable and network broadcaster both embrace streaming only model, this problem will become much worse, and soon.
How can this problem be solved? Netflix would argue that the FCC should expand the definition of net neutrality to cover interconnection, and force ISPs access to pay for upgrades to interconnection to manage ever increasing consumer demands for Internet entertainment. the FCC has indicated that it will address the interconnections, but it is unlikely to place them in the same bucket as net neutrality. Internet service providers have argued that Netflix is looking for a free ride, and that content companies should pay for direct interconnection. Netflix has done this, and the performance of its traffic has improved considerably. HBO recently reported that he believed content companies and ISPs should share the financial burden of upgrading our infrastructure to meet increased demand streaming entertainment.
To some extent, the market works
One could watch Netflix situation and concluded that the work of the market. The problem for Netflix is that they do not want to be beholden to large Internet service providers to access, many of which also own the content companies that compete with Netflix. If the cost of a direct connection should change in the future, Netflix is worried Comcast and Verizon have all the leverage.
This brings us to the nuclear option: the FCC using Title II to declare our Internet broadband infrastructure of a common carrier. It would transform Comcast and Verizon infrastructure in dumb pipes shared by all, allowing any company to offer itself as an access ISP, which has worked well in England and France. And as we have reported, this is exactly how Verizon itself describes the fiber when it was receiving tax breaks and the right of way to put in the ground.
Given the relative timidity of the FCC and ISPs winning record in court, however, this seems unlikely. This means that for now we are left with a disturbing state of affairs, one in which companies haggling over costs threatens the performance of our most important communication and information tool. As M-Lab concluded in its report, "the interconnection of ISPs has a significant impact on Internet performance consumer --sometimes a strong negative impact - and that business relations between Internet service providers, not no major technical problems, are at the origin of the problems we observed. "
on social image epSos.de / Flickr
