p2pnet news | Freedom:- Canadians will have a chance to make their feelings even more clear on Bell Canada’s continuing efforts to stifle net neutrality and block its own customers from freely using the services they’ve paid for.

More than 1,100 people have already filed complaints in support of two CAIP submissions to the CRTC demanding Bell Canada be ordered to stop its traffic throttling activities, p2pnet posted yesterday, going on:

“Yet the CRTC (Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission) has, for the moment, at least, ignored their concerns.

“Instead, it’s turned down the CAIP (Canadian Association of Internet Providers) request for interim relief against the way in which Bell Canada is routinely throttling competitor ISPs’ ADSL traffic.”

The CRTC rejected appeals by 55 small Canadian IPS, represented by CAIP (Canadian Association of Internet Providers) but says it’ll open a public consultation on internet traffic throttling, says the CBC.

“Bell has been slowing the speeds of its own subscribers who use peer-to-peer applications such as BitTorrent since November, and extended the practice to its wholesale customers in March, prompting the complaint by CAIP,” says the story.

‘Bandwidth hogs’

Bell has been unsuccessfully trying to claim P2P file sharers, whom it says represent only 5% of users, are hogging so much bandwidth they’re causing serious online congestion.

However, “According to Danny McPherson, CTO of Arbor Networks, who ‘makes all sorts of network-management and traffic-shaping tools’, used by over 70% of the ISPs around the world,” during peak-load times, 70% of subscribers use http and only 20% are using P2P, says p2pnet’s Ottawa Gal, who was the first to reveal the Bell Canada throttling scandal, going on:

Http still makes up most of the total traffic, of which 45% is traditional web content including text and images. Streaming video and audio content from services such as YouTube account for nearly 50% of the http traffic. Streaming content such as TV shows and YouTube is on the rise.”

This clearly shows the so-called bandwidth hogs, “are, in fact, ordinary, average http users during peak time, and NOT Bell’s fictitious 5% of ‘heavy” P2P users’ who suck up around 50% of the total available bandwidth,” she says.

CRTC decision ‘correct’

CAIP, meanwhile, was asking for temporary relief from the bandwidth throttling while the CRTC continued to ponder the issue, saying in its view, CAIP hadn’t shown its members would suffer irreparable harm if it wasn’t granted.

“The CRTC also said it would address the larger issue of a full probe in a letter to Bell and CAIP to be sent on Thursday,” says the CBC, going on:

“Peggy Nebout, a spokesperson for the regulator, said the letter would start a process that will allow the public to comment on the issue of traffic shaping. The CRTC expects to make a decision in the fall, she said.”

Predictably, Bell spokesman Mirko Bibic lauded the CRTC decision as the correct one.

“We look forward to dealing with the final disposition of the CAIP application in accordance with whatever process the commission sets out tomorrow,” the story has Bibic saying.

“We look forward to that because we’ll be able to get more facts on the table.”

However, Bibic’s facts to date have been considerably less than factual.

Meanwhile, the Net neutrality rally slated on May 27 will go ahead as planned.

“We expect the CRTC decision will encourage even more people to be there,” a spokesman told p2pnet.

Click here for the full CRTC report, and click here for the regularly updated p2pnet traffic throttling digest.

Meanwhile, stay tuned.

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UPDATE - Click here for the full CRTC probe document.

. .Stumble It!

p2pnet – CRTC Bell throttling decision: full document, May 14, 2008
Ottawa Gal – Bell Canada’s ‘5% of users’ claim trashed, April 25, 2008
first to reveal – Bell Sympatico P2P Black List, November 3, 2007
Net neutrality rally – May 27 confirmed for Net Neutrality rally, May 13, 2008

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This entry was posted on Thursday, May 15th, 2008 at 6:20 am and is filed under Freedom, P2P. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

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