Bypass Bell traffic throttling: the nitty-gritty
p2pnet news Freedom | P2P:- Bell Canada is infuriating its own customers by throttling their Net services in a bizarre form of censoring, and which also effectively blocks net neutrality.
The practise is being roundly condemned by everyone from individual subscribers, through 55 smaller Canadian ISPs, to search giant Google.
But Bell is hell bent on continuing.
The ISPs are represented by CAIP (Canadian Association of Internet Providers), which started the ball rolling by demanding CRTC order Bell to cease and desist.
Other organisations joined in, including Per Vices, a Toronto consultancy which on its web page states, simply, “We solve problems.”
It certainly does.
In its own submission to the CRTC (Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission), it included a brief description of how users could get around Bell’s throttling efforts.
We had quite a few emails asking us to go into detail, but JB did the trick with a Reader’s Write explaining information is on page 3/5 of the original PDF Document.
“The standard VPN TCP port is 1723/TCP, with IPSec key exchange protocol using UDP port 500/UDP, and TCP port 50 and 51 for IPSec Encapsulating Security Protocol, and IPSec Authentication Header traffic respectively,” says JB, quoting per Vice’s submission.
Now the company’s Victor Wollesen (applied research) and Yi Yao (research and development) have gone a step further by publishing a technical brief which explains in detail how to bypass Bell Canada’s traffic shaping effort.
“In general, there are two steps to enabling peer-to-peer communication over the Bell Canada DSL Network,” they state, going on >>>
Bypassing Bell Canada Throttling Using Protocol Encryption
It is first necessary to force protocol encryption for all connections. Then, route traffic over the VPN port TCP/1723, optionally using the IPSec ports (UDP/50, UDP/51) for for DHT or tracker.
[NOTE: Part of a sentence is missing here, but Wollesen and Yi continue ] … At this point, it may be necessary to renew your IP address. Assuming you have a dynamic IP, this could be accomplished as simply as reconnecting to your DSL service, or rebooting the DSL modem. If you have a static IP, it may be necessary to wait an unknown period of time, or else request a new one.
Examples
uTorrent
Proceedure
The following has been tested to work to uTorrent v1.7.7.
1. Launch uTorrent.
2. Select Options then Preferences.
3. Click on BitTorrent from the preference tree.
4. Under the Protocol Encryption heading, select Forced. Ensure that the Allow incoming legacy connections box is unchecked.
Illustration 1: The preference settings box showing the BitTorrent section settings.
5. Click on Connection from the preference tree.
6. Under the Listening Port heading, select the Port used for incoming connections, and set it 1723.
7. Ensure that the Randomize port each time uTorrent starts box is unchecked.
8. Click on OK, and reconnect to your DSL service or reboot your DSL modem.
Illustration 2: The preference settings box showing the connection section settings.
KTorrent
Proceedure
The following has been tested to work to KTorrent v2.2.6.
1. Launch KTorrent.
2. Select Settings, then Configure KTorrent.
3. Click on the Download section.
4. Under the Preferences header, set the Port to 1723, and the UDP tracker port to 50.
Illustration 3: The download section of the KTorrent configuration box.
5. Click on the General section.
6. Under the DHT header, select the UDP port for DHT communications, and type 51.
Illustration 4: The general section of the KTorrent configuration box.
7. Type OK, and reconnect to your DSL service or reboot your DSL modem.
“A lack of public information as to the specific method or techniques used by Bell Canada in throttling users service prevents us from guaranteeing this method,” Wollesen and Yi state, adding:
“This method was tested over the network of a third party ISP. It has been independently confirmed to work on retail Sympatico customers.
“It our hope that this is of use in allowing users to experience full connectivity.”
Stay tuned.
Jon Newton – p2pnet
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July 9th, 2008 at 9:54 am
Of course, now that this information is being widely circulated, don’t be surprised if Bell soon closes off this solution.
Instead of looking for workarounds to the throttling, it’s too bad we can’t just “workaround” the ISPs themselves! Hey! If they keep arbitrarily and illegally changing the playfield, why shouldn’t we just find a way to gain internet access without them? (Yeah, I know…)
July 10th, 2008 at 4:40 pm
ESP/AH TCP port 50/51, UDP port 50/51… sheesh, what morons!!!
Try IP protocol 50/51.
February 21st, 2009 at 1:28 am
@DA: You are an idiot. Is that flaming if it is true?
@ Reader’s Write: Amen =]
Honestly it’s just the “smart” thing to do by encrypting your web traffic, no matter what it may be, you never know who or what (program specific) is watching your every move on the interwebz. As for the ISPs, what they do isn’t illegal, it’s simply a measure to endure so that they can legally stay in business in the trying times that exist where free information cannot be shared because of thick pieces of paper that say we can’t.
February 21st, 2009 at 1:29 am
Oh and an addendum to your ports listed above to use, If you plan on actually getting good speeds then you must have a port file larger than 32000.
March 6th, 2009 at 12:31 am
Just to say that I followed instructions and it works 100%,
Tks 1000x !
March 13th, 2009 at 12:50 am
my udp 500 50 and 51 had errors but its working!!! from 26kb to 150kb and thats in 2min!!!
your epic
March 17th, 2009 at 10:31 pm
Just want to confirm this positively works. I am on a Primus DSL connection. Instead of 24kb/s i now have 100 kb/s woho! Thanks!
I am connected through a linksys router wireless as well. Of course I had to change my port forwarding appropriately.
May 31st, 2009 at 9:55 pm
Just wanted to say, both “wow” and “thanks”… Even still in June 2009, this really works and I can’t thank you enough
July 1st, 2009 at 11:12 pm
Hello,
Tried configuring my uTorrent, restarted the modem and router, and I’m still stuck at 30KB/s.
Did anything change since may 31st?
Thanks
Loa
July 24th, 2009 at 9:53 pm
Did you open a port on your router also?
July 25th, 2009 at 9:15 pm
Wondering how to defeat the sympatico throttle on Utorrent 1.8.3
1723
All is unchecked on CONNECTION tab
All is unchecked in BITORRENT tab
port forwarded
Any help would be appreciated. i tried the several pdfs and checked out dslreports forums and a few others.
david
July 31st, 2009 at 7:08 pm
What What ….. just went from 40k to 1.4 megaBYTE a second with utorrent 1.7.7 !!!!! Thanks guys !!!!!!!!!
August 13th, 2009 at 11:40 pm
I just received a the 2Wire modem & am trying to figure this out. I’m using Utorrent 1.8.3 & have tried the above steps with no change..am I missing steps here? Do I need to set the ports on the Application Support page as well?
August 17th, 2009 at 2:57 am
thank you so much….SUCK IT BELL
September 12th, 2009 at 11:49 pm
I set this up 3 weeks ago and it worked great. I was consistently getting speeds between 250 and 300 Kb/s, which is normal. Late last week I noticed my speeds have dropped down to 24 to 28 Kb/s. What gives? Is Bell’s deep packet inspection able to get through the encryption? If so then surely that is a wilful breach of privacy!!
September 20th, 2009 at 8:12 pm
I am having the same problem with useless download speeds with bittorrent as welll the last 3 weeks since they came up with a recent update of BT it can only download it seems a maxium of 5 links too
November 16th, 2009 at 1:28 am
Thank you so much,I got my speed back ! f@ck you bell !
April 28th, 2010 at 6:57 pm
Wow,
April 2010, it’s still works…
Great,
Thanks
July 3rd, 2010 at 1:44 am
July 2010, works with uTorrent on a Mac as well (Only mention this because uTorrent options are different on the Apple patform.)
Started noticing that during peak hours my torrents would slow to a 30 kb/s max so I investigated, came across this workaround and am happy to report that I’m currently downloading something at 400 kb/s again.
Regards.
July 17th, 2010 at 10:36 am
As of July 2010, utorrent 2.0.2 on windows and works flawlessly using above instructions. 533kb/sec multiple torrent downloads. Thanks.
January 31st, 2011 at 4:11 pm
Here is a similar way you can use to achieve this. Check it out:
http://www.high-on-it.co.za/2011/01/how-to-bypass-isp-shaping.html
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