Internet privacy is dead, redux
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@boomzilla said in Internet privacy is dead, redux:
In other words, privacy rules should be based on the data itself.
But who decides what data should be what level of private?
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@anotherusername said in Internet privacy is dead, redux:
Many Europeans live inside of the UK.
Well, Britain is different from the rest of Europe and sometimes "special". What else is new?
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@e4tmyl33t said in Internet privacy is dead, redux:
@boomzilla said in Internet privacy is dead, redux:
In other words, privacy rules should be based on the data itself.
But who decides what data should be what level of private?
Well, so far that seems to have been the FTC, until the FCC butted in. The op-ed says that we should continue along those lines. Maybe he's right, maybe he's wrong.
But everyone's panic seems to be along the lines of, "We must do something! That was something! How could you possibly vote against it‽"
And when I only hear one side, I'm sure that there's more to it than that. I mean...maybe it really is as simple as ISPs throwing money at Republicans, but that's a bit too neat and just so for my taste.
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@lolwhat said in Internet privacy is dead, redux:
I want the whole iceberg to
be regulatednot exist.Filed under: AGW FTW
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@RaceProUK said in Internet privacy is dead, redux:
@izzion True, but to avoid Google and Facebook et al would require me to move to Mars or something.
I personally use Startpage. A colleague at a place I used to work pointed it out to me. It's Google without the ad crap.
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@anotherusername said in Internet privacy is dead, redux:
I find it kind of ironic that Europeans, many of whom can't walk from point A to B without being recorded by 3 separate surveillance cameras every step of the way, also tend to have the strictest regulations to prevent them from being tracked going from point A to B on the internet. That seems pretty incongruous.
Don't confuse the UK with the rest of the EU.
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@Rhywden oh, is it not subject to EU regulations?
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@anotherusername It won't be in two years
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@boomzilla said in Internet privacy is dead, redux:
tl;dr; Some key bullets from that:
- FCC unilaterally declared a new power to regulate this sort of thing from the FTC
The FCC's bailiwick is communication technologies. It's right there in the name.
- All web browsing data was to be considered as sensitive as, e.g., health information
And what's wrong with that? Considering that it's hard for a third party to know what the customer considers highly sensitive and what they don't, it's best to err on the side of caution, no?
(which sounds to me like it could have some far reaching unintended consequences)
...such as?
- "The new rules also restrict an ISP’s ability to inform customers about innovative and cost-saving product offerings."
This is an incredibly cynical way to refer to for bombarding people with unwanted advertising.
- 'President Obama noted in 2012 that “companies should present choices about data sharing, collection, use, and disclosure that are appropriate for the scale, scope, and sensitivity of personal data in question at the time of collection.” In other words, privacy rules should be based on the data itself.'
Here's a common sense first step: no "data sharing, collection, use, and disclosure" of any kind is appropriate under any circumstances, unless the data is directed at you.
Would you object to the Post Office opening your mail, or FedEx rifling through your packages before delivery? If so, then how is an ISP doing something exactly analogous somehow not objectionable?
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@RaceProUK said in Internet privacy is dead, redux:
@anotherusername It won't be in two years
well..... doesn't that depend on who you ask? IIRC UK says they have time to exit and the EU says (paraphrased) "brexit dood. you gone. have fun! bye bye!"
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@accalia The letter of intent to leave the EU was delivered today, but we've not actually left yet: that will happen in exactly two years' time, whether we like it or not. The period in-between is where we negotiate the terms of our exit, and the deals to make for when we actually leave.
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@masonwheeler said in Internet privacy is dead, redux:
Would you object to the Post Office opening your mail, or FedEx rifling through your packages before delivery?
They already can, and do.
Well, the USPS supposedly can't open first class or priority mail items without a warrant...
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@RaceProUK politics be weird.......
and scary....
actually scratch that.
politics be scary.............
and weird........
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@accalia And that's why I don't get too far into it. I just vote in elections and sign online petitions.
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@masonwheeler said in Internet privacy is dead, redux:
The FCC's bailiwick is communication technologies. It's right there in the name.
So why weren't they already doing this? Sorry, but that's just lame.
Is it really insane in 2017 to be concerned about the rule of law and the process of making laws and regulations or must we only ever consider the end result (don't answer that, @antiquarian).
@masonwheeler said in Internet privacy is dead, redux:
And what's wrong with that? Considering that it's hard for a third party to know what the customer considers highly sensitive and what they don't, it's best to err on the side of caution, no?
Not on the face of it, no. Everything has a cost. Is it worth it to treat absolutely everything the same way?
@masonwheeler said in Internet privacy is dead, redux:
...such as?
Well...making stuff more expensive. Maybe too expensive to bother with.
@masonwheeler said in Internet privacy is dead, redux:
This is an incredibly cynical way to refer to for bombarding people with unwanted advertising.
Is it? How so? I mean...in detail. What did the new rule to do this? I wondered about that when I read it and it reminded me of bonehead "net neutrality" stuff like preventing mobile providers from streaming certain things to people without hitting their data quotas, but I don't know if this was the same thing. Am I crazy for wanting to know and not just screaming about "privacy?"
@masonwheeler said in Internet privacy is dead, redux:
Here's a common sense first step: no "data sharing, collection, use, and disclosure" of any kind is appropriate under any circumstances, unless the data is directed at you.
Seems pretty draconian. No data collection? That could impact a lot of stuff unintentionally, like monitoring stuff to try to make your network better.
@masonwheeler said in Internet privacy is dead, redux:
Would you object to the Post Office opening your mail, or FedEx rifling through your packages before delivery? If so, then how is an ISP doing something exactly analogous somehow not objectionable?
To be explicitly analogous it would have to be only reading something like a postcard. Opening stuff would be like, say, inspecting
httpstraffic.
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@anotherusername said in Internet privacy is dead, redux:
They already can, and do.
Well, the USPS supposedly can't open first class or priority mail items without a warrant...
...in other words, no, they actually don't, unless there's a criminal investigation going on. Certainly not as a matter of the ordinary conduct of business!
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@boomzilla said in Internet privacy is dead, redux:
Is it really insane in 2017 to be concerned about the rule of law and the process of making laws and regulations or must we only ever consider the end result (don't answer that, @antiquarian).
Wait, they're actually considering end results now instead of stopping at good intentions? Did I miss a memo or something?
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@boomzilla said in Internet privacy is dead, redux:
So why weren't they already doing this? Sorry, but that's just lame.
Perhaps because it hadn't really become a big issue until recently?
Not on the face of it, no. Everything has a cost. Is it worth it to treat absolutely everything the same way?
What cost would that be?
Well...making stuff more expensive. Maybe too expensive to bother with.
I am just fine with making invasions of my privacy too expensive to bother with. :P
Is it? How so? I mean...in detail. What did the new rule to do this?
Nothing, as far as I know. This appears to be simply the senator running his mouth. At least he didn't say "necessary hashatgs."
I wondered about that when I read it and it reminded me of bonehead "net neutrality" stuff like preventing mobile providers from streaming certain things to people without hitting their data quotas, but I don't know if this was the same thing.
Again, that's an incredibly cyincal and self-serving (from the ISPs' perspectives) view of zero-rating, that bears approximately zero resemblance to reality.
Seems pretty draconian. No data collection? That could impact a lot of stuff unintentionally, like monitoring stuff to try to make your network better.
Not really. How I'm using your network is your data. What I'm sending over it is not.
To be explicitly analogous it would have to be only reading something like a postcard. Opening stuff would be like, say, inspecting
httpstraffic.I don't agree. Unencrypted HTTP traffic goes inside data packets, not all that different from mailing an unencrypted letter inside a plain, standard envelope.
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@boomzilla said in Internet privacy is dead, redux:
preventing mobile providers from streaming certain things to people without hitting their data quotas
The problem with this wasn't that they were doing it (at least not at first), it was that it was something that they were charging for, thereby creating "preferred" status for those companies that could afford the zero-data-rating because, in general, customers would prefer to use services that did not impact their data usage.
@masonwheeler said in Internet privacy is dead, redux:
Not really. How I'm using your network is your data. What I'm sending over it is not.
Agreed. An ISP should be able to tell "That's video data". They shouldn't be able to say "Oh, this person was watching Starship Troopers at 1AM".
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@anotherusername said in Internet privacy is dead, redux:
@Rhywden oh, is it not subject to EU regulations?
I think you guys do not comprehend on a rather regular basis that European countries are not exactly the homogenuous mass you make it out to be.
Also: EU regulations do not cover everything. Plus, the UK is rather notorious for wanting to have its cake and eat it, too, which means that they regularly do not feel bound by rules.
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@masonwheeler customs can open any mail they want, if it's coming into the country. And the USPS can open a lot of mail without a warrant; it's only the first class and priority mail that they can't.
https://postalinspectors.uspis.gov/contactUs/faq.aspx
4. Can Postal Inspectors open mail if they feel it may contain something illegal?
First-Class letters and parcels are protected against search and seizure under the Fourth Amendment to the Constitution, and, as such, cannot be opened without a search warrant. If there is probable cause to believe the contents of a First-Class letter or parcel violate federal law, Postal Inspectors can obtain a search warrant to open the mailpiece. Other classes of mail do not contain private correspondence, and therefore may be opened without a warrant.But if you look around on the web, you can find lots of (current or former) shipping company employees who'll admit that opening packages happened far more often than their agencies' official statements would indicate.
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@anotherusername Despite the fancy name, "only the first class and priority mail" comprises essentially everything you think of as standard mail. A first-class stamp is the standard stamp you buy at the post office. Sub-first-class mail is bulk mail, (aka. "junk mail",) not legitimate correspondence.
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@masonwheeler said in Internet privacy is dead, redux:
I wondered about that when I read it and it reminded me of bonehead "net neutrality" stuff like preventing mobile providers from streaming certain things to people without hitting their data quotas, but I don't know if this was the same thing.
Again, that's an incredibly cyincal and self-serving (from the ISPs' perspectives) view of zero-rating, that bears approximately zero resemblance to reality.
It bears quite a bit of resemblance to my current mobile plan, where I get music streaming for free. It's a welcome change from my prior situation, which was "getting butt fucked on data like every other Canadian mobile consumer"
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@masonwheeler said in Internet privacy is dead, redux:
I don't agree. Unencrypted HTTP traffic goes inside data packets, not all that different from mailing an unencrypted letter inside a plain, standard envelope.
Simply writing your data in the data packet's frame is no different than writing it on a postcard. Anyone moving it from point A to point B can see it as a matter of course.
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@masonwheeler for letters, yes, but packages, no... Media Mail, Library Mail, Bound Printed Matter, Parcel Select? All of those can be opened.
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@masonwheeler said in Internet privacy is dead, redux:
What cost would that be?
Compliance with the rules.
@masonwheeler said in Internet privacy is dead, redux:
I am just fine with making invasions of my privacy too expensive to bother with.
But you are also fine with making non-invasions of your privacy too expensive to bother with.
@masonwheeler said in Internet privacy is dead, redux:
Not really. How I'm using your network is your data. What I'm sending over it is not.
Yes. But you just forbade all collection. And invited frivolous lawsuits and enforcement and additional compliance costs.
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@e4tmyl33t said in Internet privacy is dead, redux:
The problem with this wasn't that they were doing it (at least not at first), it was that it was something that they were charging for, thereby creating "preferred" status for those companies that could afford the zero-data-rating because, in general, customers would prefer to use services that did not impact their data usage.
Yeah...so...not an actual problem?
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@boomzilla said in Internet privacy is dead, redux:
Yeah...so...not an actual problem?
Except for the inherent barrier to entry that places on smaller operations, fresh startups, and the like in favor of the bigger companies...
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@e4tmyl33t said in Internet privacy is dead, redux:
Except for the inherent barrier to entry that places on smaller operations, fresh startups, and the like in favor of the bigger companies...
Exactly. Remember when Google and Netflix were tiny upstart companies that had a cool product and literally nothing else going for them? Zero rating and similar Net Neutrality-breaking shenanigans make it that much harder for the next Google or Netflix to get off the ground. That sure sounds like an "actual problem" to me!
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@e4tmyl33t
We're not going to agree on this and it's really not the subject of this topic.
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@boomzilla True, and this isn't the Garage, so I'll walk away.
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@masonwheeler
I just want to point out that Netflix didn't get started with Internet streaming at all. Their startup product was DVD by postal mail. And they benefited from the postal mail's "special handling rules" (business reply mail, bulk mailing rates) in their startup - their model wouldn't really have worked in a Postal Neutrality world where everything had to be sent First Class.
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@anotherusername said in Internet privacy is dead, redux:
@Rhywden oh, is it not subject to EU regulations?
You're trolling, right?
And if not, why do many of the Americans keep treating all European countries as one? Plus: why do they keep talking about "Europeans" as if it was a nationality?
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@kt_ ... sort of, but the EU has imposed legislation on its member countries about such things as internet privacy / surveillance, so it's kind of silly (and a cop-out) to act like it couldn't have also imposed laws about physical privacy / surveillance if it didn't like the UK's police state level of monitoring.
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@izzion Sure, but when they started to transition to online delivery, they were pretty small in that area, not to mention pretty much the only site in the history of the Internet to be dumb enough to use Silverlight in production.
And yet somehow they managed to pull it off and be successful, because they didn't have sleazy ISPs putting artificial barriers and toll booths in place.
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@masonwheeler said in Internet privacy is dead, redux:
And yet somehow they managed to pull it off and be successful,
Because their bandwidth usage bill from their provider was pretty much their only cost at that point, and they financed their streaming service with the revenue from their DVD-by-mail service (as a loss leader, just like any regular startup). And as their product and associated costs grew, they went looking for ways to cut their cost, which meant they changed service providers (several times), eventually winding up on Level 3 because they got the best deal there. At which point Level 3's traffic profile to its major peering providers changed, said major peering providers asked for changing the peering agreements to bring them in line with industry standards for the changed traffic profile, and Level 3 refused. At which point Level 3's business dispute with their peering providers led to ALL traffic through those peering points (Netflix and otherwise, though mostly Netflix) getting congested at certain times of day. Rather than voting with their pocketbook, Netflix took it to the public debate, and thus the "Net Neutrality" cause was born.
. https://qz.com/256586/the-inside-story-of-how-netflix-came-to-pay-comcast-for-internet-traffic/
And yes, that article is written from a slant that doesn't really directly support my point - it's written from the same "all interconnection should be free" slant.
. http://www.internap.com/2014/03/07/despite-comcast-netflix-deal-settlement-free-peering-alive-well/
All the same, telco die-hards and their sympathizers will continue to argue that settlement-free peering doesn’t add up. To them, large content producers are abusing access networks by lumping traffic on their pipes, whether or not this is the same content requested of their revenue-generating customers. Care and feeding of large-scale networks does not come cheap, and everyone needs to pay their fair share in network upgrades. It is also believed that traffic ratios should factor into economic settlement: if a network is generating traffic predominantly towards a network, rather than receiving traffic from it, then it should bear the majority of the cost burden.
That view from the "telco die-hards" is what industry standard interconnection / peering agreements have looked like in the Internet world from day 1 (and what they have looked like in the telephone world since AT&T was broken up) -- as long as two connected networks send similar amounts of traffic in both ways, the providers agree to shrug their shoulders and not charge each other, each bearing their own cost of maintaining equipment to make the connection work. If one side sends significantly more traffic into the other's network, the net receiving network bills the net sending network for the balance (this also happens when you place a phone call).
Early-form Netflix wouldn't have been blocked by "non-neutral networks", because it was small enough it could work through standard carriers, without altering the balance of traffic between carrier networks. Late-form Netflix got into trouble because it was exercising its pricing power (it was a huge player, and shopped around for the lowest transit price, and rightfully so) and wound up in a situation where no transit carrier could make the product work at the price Netflix was willing to pay, because the transit carrier couldn't afford to pay interconnection charges to the ISP networks, or they would lose money on the Netflix traffic.
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@izzion said in Internet privacy is dead, redux:
And as their product and associated costs grew, they went looking for ways to cut their cost, which meant they changed service providers (several times), eventually winding up on Level 3 because they got the best deal there.
Yes, once Netflix's delivery became a significant fraction of the total Internet traffic, they moved to a direct connection to the Internet backbone through a Tier 1 ISP, Level 3.
At which point Level 3's traffic profile to its major peering providers changed, said major peering providers asked for changing the peering agreements to bring them in line with industry standards for the changed traffic profile, and Level 3 refused. At which point Level 3's business dispute with their peering providers led to ALL traffic through those peering points (Netflix and otherwise, though mostly Netflix) getting congested at certain times of day. Rather than voting with their pocketbook, Netflix took it to the public debate, and thus the "Net Neutrality" cause was born.
Wrong at many different points, some of which I'll go into further down, but the big one here is that this was not where Net Neutrality came from; it arose out of the backlash against AT&T's stated intent to block commercial traffic they didn't like. It was already a well-established thing before Netflix got involved.
And yes, that article is written from a slant that doesn't really directly support my point - it's written from the same "all interconnection should be free" slant.
The further you get from the fumes of ISP insane troll logic, the more clear it becomes that this "slant" is simply the most obvious and correct solution.
. http://www.internap.com/2014/03/07/despite-comcast-netflix-deal-settlement-free-peering-alive-well/
Care and feeding of large-scale networks does not come cheap, and everyone needs to pay their fair share in network upgrades.
And this is the Big Lie. The price of the necessary upgrades would have been on the order of tens of thousands of dollars, pocket change to a company that measures revenue in billions. Level 3 did offer to pay for the price of the upgrades, as if it mattered, but domestic ISPs such as Comcast and Verizon refused, instead trying to establish a toll bridge on their routers, trying to get paid twice for delivering the same data.
That view from the "telco die-hards" is what industry standard interconnection / peering agreements have looked like in the Internet world from day 1 (and what they have looked like in the telephone world since AT&T was broken up) -- as long as two connected networks send similar amounts of traffic in both ways, the providers agree to shrug their shoulders and not charge each other, each bearing their own cost of maintaining equipment to make the connection work. If one side sends significantly more traffic into the other's network, the net receiving network bills the net sending network for the balance (this also happens when you place a phone call).
Nope. There's a big qualitative difference between peering between backbone ISPs and delivery from backbone carriers to domestic ("last-mile") ISPs. That relationship has always been heavily asymmetric, for reasons that should be intuitively obvious to anyone familiar with the difference between the size of an HTTP request message and the size of a web page, script, image, or binary download. And they've taken active steps to ensure it stays heavily asymmetrical: you get way less upload speed than download speed on your ISP connection, and you're explicitly forbidden from running an Internet-facing server as part of the standard T&C of essentially every home ISP plan.
This was purely a case of Verizon & co attempting to act as bridge trolls, with zero justification. They created a situation where they received far more data than they sent, long before Netflix came on the scene.
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@masonwheeler said in Internet privacy is dead, redux:
Nope. There's a big qualitative difference between peering between backbone ISPs and delivery from backbone carriers to domestic ("last-mile") ISPs. That relationship has always been heavily asymmetric, for reasons that should be intuitively obvious to anyone familiar with the difference between the size of an HTTP request message and the size of a web page, script, image, or binary download. And they've taken active steps to ensure it stays heavily asymmetrical: you get way less upload speed than download speed on your ISP connection, and you're explicitly forbidden from running an Internet-facing server as part of the standard T&C of essentially every home ISP plan.
Part of the problem is the line is now blurring between backbone ISPs and last-mile ISPs thanks to mergers. So, now you have companies that are logically last-mile ISPs that own backbone segments, but peering rules haven't changed to take this situation into account.
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@masonwheeler said in Internet privacy is dead, redux:
The price of the necessary upgrades would have been on the order of tens of thousands of dollars,
At the interconnect point, sure.
For transit across the continent, you're looking at $20,000-$50,000 per mile for a cable install, which will typically include 144 or 288 strands per wire pulled (2 strands per connection, so a single pull is 70-140 'connections', turning up a new connection is around $300 per mile for the connection, or $750,000 for your new connection from LA to New York or Miami). Plus there's the actual optics for the link, boosters for the long distance (and/or extra stops in the middle complete with even more hardware). The cost of all of which is being borne by Comcast, since Netflix isn't a transit network provider.
@masonwheeler said in Internet privacy is dead, redux:
Net Neutrality came from; it arose out of the backlash against AT&T's stated intent to block commercial traffic they didn't like.
Do you have a citation for that?
@masonwheeler said in Internet privacy is dead, redux:
There's a big qualitative difference between peering between backbone ISPs and delivery from backbone carriers to domestic ("last-mile") ISPs. That relationship has always been heavily asymmetric, for reasons that should be intuitively obvious to anyone familiar with the difference between the size of an HTTP request message and the size of a web page, script, image, or binary download.
Which is why smaller ISPs jumped at the chance to eat (pay) the server hosting costs for Netflix's Open Connect - they have to pay for their transit just like Netflix does, so hosting a Netflix cache server reduced their costs by more than the cost of hosting the server did.
For Verizon/Comcast Residential, they buy their transit from Verizon/Comcast Transit (effectively), so if they eat the cost of the Open Connect server, they save nothing. If you want to make an argument that a company shouldn't be allowed to be both a Transit provider and a domestic ISP, I think that's a reasonable argument that could be debated on the facts.
But the "Net Neutrality" argument is based on a fiction: ISPs weren't blocking or filtering Netflix traffic; Netflix's transit carrier was playing chicken. Whether Netflix knew that and went along with a false argument, or whether they got duped by their transit carrier's "No, it's not us, Verizon is intentionally making your traffic work like shit" argument, it doesn't change the fact that the facts of the case don't support the argument that was being made.
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@izzion said in Internet privacy is dead, redux:
At the interconnect point, sure.
...which is where the upgrades were needed.
For transit across the continent, you're looking at $20,000-$50,000 per mile for a cable install, which will typically include 144 or 288 strands per wire pulled (2 strands per connection, so a single pull is 70-140 'connections', turning up a new connection is around $300 per mile for the connection, or $750,000 for your new connection from LA to New York or Miami). Plus there's the actual optics for the link, boosters for the long distance (and/or extra stops in the middle complete with even more hardware). The cost of all of which is being borne by Comcast, since Netflix isn't a transit network provider.
Wait, what?
What does any of that have to do with anything? The infrastructure was already there. The problem was that Verizon et al were refusing needed upgrades at the interconnection points, purposely letting traffic clog up so they could point a finger at Netflix and use it as leverage in their plan to double-dip on data charges that they were already being paid for by their customers.
Needing new cables installed was never something anyone talked about, that I've heard at least, and I've been following the issue pretty closely for a few years now.
@masonwheeler said in Internet privacy is dead, redux:
Net Neutrality came from; it arose out of the backlash against AT&T's stated intent to block commercial traffic they didn't like.
Do you have a citation for that?
My mistake. It wasn't AT&T, technically; it was SBC. (Which bought out AT&T soon after and changed its name to AT&T.) Back in 2005--almost a decade before the Netflix dispute--Ed Whitacre, CEO of SBC started talking about plans to double-dip on data carriage, to make large sites such as Google and Yahoo! pay for access that SBC customers were already paying for, or be blocked if they didn't pay up and continued to try to "use my pipes free".
The controversy over this event dragged the concept of network neutrality (coined in 2003 by law professor Tim Wu) into the spotlight for the first time.
A pretty thorough overview of the basics can be found here:
Everything You've Wanted To Know About Net Neutrality But Were Afraid To Ask
Okay, ever since our big Net Neutrality Crowdfunding, we’ve had some new readers who aren’t as familiar with the details and issues — yet we’ve been mostly writing as if eve…
For Verizon/Comcast Residential, they buy their transit from Verizon/Comcast Transit (effectively), so if they eat the cost of the Open Connect server, they save nothing.
They still save the cost of obtaining the data from peers. (Which is apparently way expensive, to hear them whine and moan about it! Can't have it both ways...)
But the "Net Neutrality" argument is based on a fiction: ISPs weren't blocking or filtering Netflix traffic;
...which was never claimed; they definitely did try to (and occasionally did) block other services, though.
Netflix's transit carrier was playing chicken.
Netflix's transit carrier offered to pay for the needed upgrades. Comcast & friends refused, because this would have gotten in the way of their double-dipping tollbooth scheme.
Whether Netflix knew that and went along with a false argument, or whether they got duped by their transit carrier's "No, it's not us, Verizon is intentionally making your traffic work like shit" argument, it doesn't change the fact that the facts of the case don't support the argument that was being made.
Huh? The only "fact" you've presented in favor of this is a bunch of numbers about how much it costs to install new data lines, which was never relevant to the discussion in the first place.
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He cited the example of a specific interconnection in Dallas which, for most of each day during a recent week, was unable to accept all of the traffic that was trying to get through.
Interconnects happen at specific (major) cities. Getting traffic from those cities to other major cities requires aforementioned data lines, meaning either Level 3 needed to build out those lines and distribute its traffic to additional interconnect points closer to the ultimate customers, or turn up additional interconnection capacity in Dallas "where the ports are just sitting idle, waiting to be turned up!" and let someone else (Comcast/Verizon) maintain & pay for the transit of getting the traffic elsewhere.
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Even now, Level 3 only peers with Verizon in 2 meet points, through the entire country.
You know what major Internet content provider hasn't had any problems getting new interconnect agreements established with ISPs, including Comcast and Verizon?
Because they paid the cost of building out their own fiber network between 10 major interconnection points all across the country, and are working with the ISPs to ensure that traffic transitions to the Riot Direct network as close to the end user as possible.
Granted, they have a technological reason (latency, jitter, and packet loss are much more important for them than raw bandwidth), but they didn't choose to start a major regulatory push to get their traffic to their customers. They worked within industry standards, they got it done, and they have significantly improved the reliability of traffic to their customers in just 2 short years.
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@izzion Again, the data lines were already there. (The data lines were obviously already there; otherwise how did the traffic get to the clogged bottlenecks in the first place?) The congestion happened because the domestic ISPs were refusing to install the necessary router capacity at the interconnect points, deliberately letting them clog up to slow things down for leverage. "Building out new lines" is nothing but a red herring.
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@masonwheeler
Once the data lines got used for carrying Level 3's traffic, they couldn't be used for anything else. Even if they didn't have to pull a new $300 per mile pair, they had one less $300 per mile pair left for their own future expansion. It still would have been at least an opportunity cost, even if not a physical cost.
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@izzion said in Internet privacy is dead, redux:
Even now, Level 3 only peers with Verizon in 2 meet points, through the entire country.
You do realize that XO Communications is also Verizon, right?
Actually, I'm not sure why UUNet is using the Verizon moniker now and XO isn't.
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@powerlord
Huh, TIL. Still, that's only a total of five interconnects (Washington DC, Atlanta, Dallas, St Louis, and San Jose)
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@izzion said in Internet privacy is dead, redux:
It still would have been at least an opportunity cost, even if not a physical cost.
That's pretty much the weakest possible argument. Properly understood, "opportunity cost" is essentially synonymous with "choice" and literally everything is an opportunity cost. For example, the time I'm taking to write this post, I could be spending doing any number of other things.
If you choose to dedicate a lot of your lines to carrying the traffic that makes up the majority of the data your users are requesting, at the "expense" of not having the "opportunity" left over to devote as much for traffic that makes up a smaller share of what your users are requesting... why is that a bad thing? It sounds like exactly the right outcome.
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I run nordvpn for the most part in the UK so it isn't obvious what I am browsing as a fuck you to Theresa May.
However I don't trust Windows or MacOS, but I run the VPN as more of a protest against the collection rather than to hide my activities.
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@masonwheeler
Yeah, it's a choice. But once the line is in service, it definitely has to be maintained (and all the associated eventual replacement costs), plus the actual physical costs of the transceivers and signal boosters to make the link work (which are tens of thousands of dollars themselves for long distance), even besides the cost of the transit line itself.Similarly, Netflix had a choice to pay the standard rates for interconnection. They chose to stick to an offer of $0. They had a choice to pay the standard rates for colocation. They chose to stick to an offer of $0. How it it Comcast's fault that Netflix chose not to ensure their customers were getting proper service?
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@izzion We've been over this already.
Netflix was already paying its ISP for bandwidth it was using. Other ISPs were trying to extort Netflix into paying them for bandwidth that they were already charging their own users for. Of course Netflix said "screw that"; it was a completely unreasonable request on the ISPs' part.
I do not get why this is so difficult for you to comprehend.
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[Netflix --Transit Provider's Network--> Backbone Meetpoint] --Interconnect to other networks--> [Backbone Meetpoint --ISP Network--> Customer Meetpoint] Netflix pays their Transit provider for this Standard is sender pays for this Customer pays their transit provider for thisBut because Netflix's transit providers couldn't make money while paying for their interconnect like a standard net sender, they chose to hold their customers' traffic hostage until they got interconnect on their terms, and then try to lay the blame off on the ISPs.
Level 3 Peering Dispute: Ports to 5 U.S. Internet Providers are Permanently Congested
