Turnabout: FCC to investigate Comcast blocking BitTorrent

[Dr Mordrid]

Link....

FCC to investigate Comcast BitTorrent blocking

By Ryan Paul | Published: January 08, 2008 - 11:55PM CT

The FCC is preparing to investigate accusations that cable provider Comcast is disrupting peer-to-peer file-sharing traffic on its network.
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A study conducted last year by the Electronic Frontier Foundation and independently verified by the Associated Press revealed that Comcast interferes with BitTorrent and Gnutella sessions by sending TCP "reset" packets to users. Despite the growing body of unambiguous evidence, Comcast still denies allegations that it specifically targets BitTorrent. Comcast vice president David Cohen told us that the company's traffic control mechanisms conform to the FCC's definition of "reasonable network management" practices (which are allowed by the FCC), but critics don't agree that Comcast's management is anything "reasonable." The FCC today indicated that "reasonable" practices should be transparent.

"Sure, we're going to investigate and make sure that no consumer is going to be blocked," said Kevin Martin at CES today, reports the AP. "The question is going to arise: Are they reasonable network practices? When they have reasonable network practices, they should disclose those and make those public."

At CES, Comcast reiterated to Ars Technica that it engages in "reasonable traffic management" and said that it looks forward to responding to any FCC inquiries. "We believe our practices are in accordance with the FCC's policy statement on the Internet where the Commission clearly recognized that reasonable network management is necessary for the good of all customers," said Comcast executive VP David L. Cohen in a statement. "Comcast plans to work with the Commission in its desire to bring more transparency for consumers regarding broadband network management."
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[Dr Mordrid]

Depending on how the Feds decide on what Comcast is doing others may join in their little game;

NY Times story....

AT&T and Other ISPs May Be Getting Ready to Filter

For the past fifteen years, Internet service providers have acted - to use an old cliche - as wide-open information super-highways, letting data flow uninterrupted and unimpeded between users and the Internet.

But ISPs may be about to embrace a new metaphor: traffic cop.

At a small panel discussion about digital piracy here at NBC’s booth on the Consumer Electronics Show floor, representatives from NBC, Microsoft, several digital filtering companies and telecom giant AT&T said the time was right to start filtering for copyrighted content at the network level.

Such filtering for pirated material already occurs on sites like YouTube and Microsoft’s Soapbox, and on some university networks.

Network-level filtering means your Internet service provider – Comcast, AT&T, EarthLink, or whoever you send that monthly check to – could soon start sniffing your digital packets, looking for material that infringes on someone’s copyright.

“What we are already doing to address piracy hasn’t been working. There’s no secret there,” said James Cicconi, senior vice president, external & legal affairs for AT&T.

Mr. Cicconi said that AT&T has been talking to technology companies, and members of the MPAA and RIAA, for the last six months about implementing digital fingerprinting techniques on the network level.

“We are very interested in a technology based solution and we think a network-based solution is the optimal way to approach this,” he said. “We recognize we are not there yet but there are a lot of promising technologies. But we are having an open discussion with a number of content companies, including NBC Universal, to try to explore various technologies that are out there.”

Internet civil rights organizations oppose network-level filtering, arguing that it amounts to Big Brother monitoring of free speech, and that such filtering could block the use of material that may fall under fair-use legal provisions — uses like parody, which enrich our culture.

Rick Cotton, the general counsel of NBC Universal, who has led the company’s fights against companies like YouTube for the last three years, clearly doesn’t have much tolerance for that line of thinking.

“The volume of peer-to-peer traffic online, dominated by copyrighted materials, is overwhelming. That clearly should not be an acceptable, continuing status,” he said. “The question is how we collectively collaborate to address this.”

I asked the panelists how they would respond to objections from their customers over network level filtering – for example, the kind of angry outcry Comcast saw last year, when it was accused of clamping down on BitTorrent traffic on its network.

“Whatever we do has to pass muster with consumers and with policy standards. There is going to be a spotlight on it,” said Mr. Cicconi of AT&T.

After the session, he told me that ISPs like AT&T would have to handle such network filtering delicately, and do more than just stop an upload dead in its tracks, or send a legalistic cease and desist form letter to a customer. “We’ve got to figure out a friendly way to do it, there’s no doubt about it,” he said.

[Fluff]

So what can / will they do about VPNs?

[Gurm]

You know what else is a big, pervasive problem? My friends coming to my house, looking at my 400+ DVD's, and borrowing some.

ALL WITHOUT PAYING THE MPAA A DIME!

OH... MY... GOD!

It's time to stop this pervasive piracy, and start monitoring what goes on inside people's homes!

[Dr Mordrid]

Thing is their snooping is so easily overcome; encrypt the files.