[Discuss] Https - the solution to net neutrality

[genuineaudio at gmail.com (Stuart Conner)]

When we, the consumers band together and demand that our isp's not slow
down our, the customer's, net activity and/or change isp's and say why
we're leaving. They listen to money. Otherwise they don't care.

I'm curious though. If you vpn from work, why doesn't the content stream
get crippled upstream from there? No matter who the last mile isp is, don't
the big telecoms own the internet backbones?


On Tue, Jul 22, 2014 at 12:00 PM, <discuss-request at blu.org> wrote:

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> Today's Topics:
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>    1. Https - the solution to net neutrality and ISP monopolies
>       (Edward Ned Harvey (blu))
>    2. Re: Https - the solution to net neutrality and ISP        monopolies
>       (Bill Horne)
>
>
> ----------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> Message: 1
> Date: Tue, 22 Jul 2014 13:10:17 +0000
> From: "Edward Ned Harvey (blu)" <blu at nedharvey.com>
> To: "discuss at blu.org" <discuss at blu.org>
> Subject: [Discuss] Https - the solution to net neutrality and ISP
>         monopolies
> Message-ID:
>         <
> 8a6a33076074465486f84ce055503bbc at CO2PR04MB684.namprd04.prod.outlook.com>
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> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"
>
> Every night when I put my daughter to bed, I read her a book, or we play
> flashlight shadow puppets, or we watch videos such as The Duck Song, or
> Blackbeard, Bluebeard, Redbeard.  We watch netflix, youtube, etc.
>
> Recently I noticed, that all our video streams get interrupted annoyingly
> frequently.  Buffering every 1-15 minutes, it's infuriating.  Sometimes I
> can dumb down the connection, switching to CC instead of HD.  Sometimes it
> helps.  Not always.
>
> So I VPN'd into work (We have a non-split-tunnel VPN available), and then
> we can watch it, no problem.  It's the same content, being delivered over
> the same network, only it's encrypted and hidden from FiOS's routers.
>  There's no other explanation, simply, caught red handed.
>
> When ISP's do something like this to Netflix, Youtube, etc, the end user
> perceives Netflix, Youtube, etc as being slow.  "It's not my internet
> connection; my internet connection works fine for other things.  This is
> just Youtube being overloaded or whatever.  Well, that's what you get when
> you try to watch something for free.  Sigh."
>
> So I got to thinking, could encryption be used to circumvent greedy ISP's
> systematically?  If everything were encrypted and unidentifiable, then the
> only thing they could do would be to throttle *all* the traffic, not just
> the big content distributors that they want to shake down.  Then, the slow
> service would be recognizable to end users for what it is - a crippled
> internet connection, and not a deficiency of Netflix, Youtube, etc.
>
> Even if everything were tunneled over https, there are two obvious
> counters that the ISP's could take:  They could inspect the DNS traffic
> and/or SSL subject name to find the name of the server.  And/or they could
> try to create a list of all of Netflix's and Youtube's IP addresses, and
> throttle traffic based on these factors.
>
> Recently I noticed, that a lot of time when I go to download some file
> from some website, the content is actually redirected to come from
> s3.amazon.com.
>
> My point is to say:
> #1 the hostname doesn't need to be recognizable as "*.youtube.com" or "*.
> netflix.com" ... These guys could randomize all new DNS names all the
> time, so the exposed servername doesn't cause a problem.
> And
> #2 Content distribution networks don't necessarily have to have small
> recognizable IP ranges.  Especially with the expansion of IPv6.  Especially
> if large content distribution networks aggregate all sorts of traffic -
> netflix, youtube, and everyone else -
>
> If the content is distributed by a content distribution network, and LOTS
> of services use those networks, then the SSL cert could be "*.akamai.com"
> (or whatever) and if the ISP's want to throttle it, their only choice is to
> throttle *all* of the content indiscriminantly.
>
>
> ------------------------------
>
> Message: 2
> Date: Tue, 22 Jul 2014 09:43:26 -0400
> From: Bill Horne <bill at horne.net>
> To: BLU Discussion List <discuss at blu.org>
> Subject: Re: [Discuss] Https - the solution to net neutrality and ISP
>         monopolies
> Message-ID: <53CE6A7E.60606 at horne.net>
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed
>
> On 7/22/2014 9:10 AM, Edward Ned Harvey (blu) wrote:
> > Recently I noticed, that all our video streams get interrupted
> annoyingly frequently.  Buffering every 1-15 minutes, it's infuriating.
>  Sometimes I can dumb down the connection, switching to CC instead of HD.
>  Sometimes it helps.  Not always.
>
> Since I have a Verizontal DSL line, I get that too. They're demanding
> that NetFlix pay them more.
>
> Not surprisingly, service to Comcast customers improved as soon as
> NetFlix starting paying more to Comcast.
>
> > So I VPN'd into work (We have a non-split-tunnel VPN available), and
> then we can watch it, no problem.  It's the same content, being delivered
> over the same network, only it's encrypted and hidden from FiOS's routers.
>  There's no other explanation, simply, caught red handed.
>
> Great idea! Since I use a separate receiver for NetFlix (it's a "Roku"
> device), I'll have to set up a proxy and redirect the Roku there.  What
> port(s) are needed? Is it all UDP?
>
>
> Bill
>
> --
> E. William Horne
> William Warren Consulting
> 339-364-8487
>
>
>
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> End of Discuss Digest, Vol 38, Issue 16
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-- 
Thanks,
Stu

617-462-0552
genuineaudio at gmail.com
blue23 at netzero.net
stuart.conner at state.ma.us

Stuart Conner
62 Rhodes Cir
Hingham, MA 02043