Comcast Throttles BitTorrent Traffic, Seeding Impossible
Written by Ernesto on August 17, 2007Over the past weeks more and more Comcast users started to notice that their BitTorrent transfers were cut off. Most users report a significant decrease in download speeds, and even worse, they are unable to seed their downloads. A nightmare for people who want to keep up a positive ratio at private trackers and for the speed of BitTorrent transfers in general.
ISPs have been throttling BitTorrent traffic for almost two years now. Most ISPs simply limit the available bandwidth for BitTorrent traffic, but Comcast takes it one step further, and prevents their customers from seeding. And Comcast is not alone in this, Canadian ISPs Cogeco and Rogers use similar methods on a smaller scale.
Unfortunately, these more aggressive throttling methods can’t be circumvented by simply enabling encryption in your BitTorrent client. It is reported that Comcast is using an application from Sandvine to throttle BitTorrent traffic. Sandvine breaks every (seed) connection with new peers after a few seconds if it’s not a Comcast user. This makes it virtually impossible to seed a file, especially in small swarms without any Comcast users. Some users report that they can still connect to a few peers, but most of the Comcast customers see a significant drop in their upload speed.
The throttling works like this: A few seconds after you connect to someone in the swarm the Sandvine application sends a peer reset message (RST flag) and the upload immediately stops. Most vulnerable are users in a relatively small swarm where you only have a couple of peers you can upload the file to. Only seeding seems to be prevented, most users are able to upload to others while the download is still going, but once the download is finished, the upload speed drops to 0. Some users also report a significant drop in their download speeds, but this seems to be less widespread. Worse on private trackers, likely that this is because of the smaller swarm size
Although BitTorrent protocol encryption seems to work against most forms of traffic shaping, it doesn’t help in this specific case. Setting up a secure connection through VPN or over SSH seems to be the only solution. More info about how to setup BitTorrent over SSH can be found here.
Last year we had a discussion whether traffic shaping is good or bad, and ISPs made it pretty clear that they do not like P2P applications like BitTorrent. One of the ISPs that joined our discussions said: “The fact is, P2P is (from my point of view) a plague - a cancer, that will consume all the bandwidth that I can provide. It’s an insatiable appetite.”, and another one stated: “P2P applications can cripple a network, they’re like leaches. Just because you pay 49.99 for a 1.5-3.0mbps connection doesn’t mean your entitled to use whatever protocols you wish on your ISP’s network without them provisioning it to make the network experience good for all users involved.”
Customers on the other hand like to fully use their connection, and don’t agree that traffic shaping is the correct solution. One reader commented: “If you pay for an internet connection, that’s what you should get from your ISP — an internet connection. Not a connection that will let you browse the web and check email, but little else. If an ISP has issues with the amount of data a customer is transferring, then the ISP needs to address that issue with that customer, and not restrict every user in one class of traffic.”
I guess this battle will go on for a while and I would advise Comcast users to try setting up a VPN connection to get around the traffic shaping, other users who find out that they are throttles might try BitTorrent encryption first, that seems to work quite well in most cases.
More details about the Sandvine application can be found here.
Previously: BitTorrent Anime Downloaders Identified, $3500 Bill in the Mail
Next: TorrentPod Episode 43
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[quote comment="148281"]I am as of today the 17th of August a Comcast cable internet subscriber. I’m not sure if this is affecting all Comcast or possibly untrue, but I am currently downloading/seeding without any issues. I seed on timer where day,early evening hours i upload at 32kb/s and late evening early morning at 64 kb/s and have done so for almost 2 years on a 24/7 basis with no problems from Comcast for doing so. I’ve up’d over 500 Terabytes this year so far, and that’s just in bitorrent traffic. I still use my net connection for games and surfing/email as well on top of this. I live in a smaller area so this may be the reason we aren’t affected. I can’t say anything bad about Comcast as of this time period. I had issues with sprint/earthlink dsl and their crap speeds before this but comcast has been reliable and almost always higher than rated speeds.[/quote]
You are so full of shit dude. Time to go back to math class. Even if you where running at 64K/s all year round non-stop with no breaks that only comes out to 1.88094091415405 TB/year… yeah lets see… 1.9TB vs 500TB… hmmm… STFU.
download big shit at night, your ISP will thank you.
leave it to comcast to literally f–k their loyal, paying clientel in the proverbial ass. I am pissed. This violates our rights and freedoms. Goodbye comcast. I hope you like losing paying customers.
[quote comment="151434"]“iptables -A INPUT -p tcp –-dport $TORRENT_CLIENT_PORT -–tcp-flags RST RST -j DROP”
Doesn’t work. My seeding starts ok but I am still disconnected fairly quickly from the other client.
Using Kubuntu / utorrent / wine[/quote]
Dropping the RST packets on my BT port has worked well for me, and previously it was impossible to seed. I even turned off encryption.
[quote comment="152159"][quote comment="151434"]“iptables -A INPUT -p tcp –-dport $TORRENT_CLIENT_PORT -–tcp-flags RST RST -j DROP”
Doesn’t work. My seeding starts ok but I am still disconnected fairly quickly from the other client.
Using Kubuntu / utorrent / wine[/quote]
Dropping the RST packets on my BT port has worked well for me, and previously it was impossible to seed. I even turned off encryption.[/quote]
Actually it does help some. Some torrents are dropped right away, some seem to seed fine. It did improve my upload speed, but it is still not as fast as it used to be.
just tried to post 2 excellent comments but it wont let me
more comcast crap
this is my 4th time trying to post…
oh and the 1st and 2nd where good.
now alls i got left in me is,……..
FUCK YOU COMCAST …YOU COMMUNISTIC PRINCIPLED BASTARDS!!!!!!!!
OF COURSE that one goes thru!
ok i apoligize for that!
your forum sux….how about an explanation where 1st timers can find. none of this black letters on black crap…none of this guessing where to put your e-mail add.
There’s no question that ISPs need to make money in order to stay in business, and that some customers are more profitable than others. That being said, the pricing model being employed by ISPs is incredibly primitive, and reflects the fact that the US broadband market is effectively a duopoly.
My parents’ ISP is Cox, and they pay $45 a month to write a few emails, download pix of the grandkids, and to do the NYT crossword online. I pay Comcast $45 a month to telecommute, use Skype, Vonage, videoconference, and watch movies and TV shows. I live online, and pay as much as someone who pays occasional visits.
That’s asinine. In much of Europe, consumers can choose between a half dozen service providers, and those service providers generally offer tiered pricing plans–fast data rates (via ADSL 2+ or VDSL), but say, a 2 GB per month data limit for $15 or $20 per month. Perfect for my parents. $25 to $30 gets you fast broadband, and an 8 GB cap. And for $50, you get a fast pipe with no limits.
There’s no reason network operators can’t price based on usage, and thereby generate the revenues they need to upgrade their networks to handle growing traffic volumes. However, in an duopoly market where two big service providers in every city want to cram a stinkin’ “triple play bundle” down everyone’s thoat, there’s not a hell of a lot of incentive to do so.
I’m rooting for anyone who is looking for a way to sell me a moderately fast (1 Mbps is more than enough, ’cause most servers stream data at way less than that), dumb pipe. But I don’t think I’m going to find any viable providers real soon.
Fight the power.
im figuring this out …every other post is black on black. thats why i thought my 3rd post didnt come up…i can not see the black on black …at all…its just a black feild…no matter how close i look at it. how stupid is that???
hope u didnt pay the genuis who came up with that idea….whoa…no wonder you guys do what you do their. must be a whole group of genuises there.
I don’t what what others have seen, but I have always found that in the USA when I run bittorent or emule my bandwidth for surfing slows down to about dial up speed with dsl, and it still slows down with comcast cable. When I was in Taiwan I had adsl, I used to be able to surf the web, use emule and bittorent at the same time and still have good speed on all my downloads.
http://www.cht.com.tw/CHTFinalE/Web/Personal.php?CatID=376
This is what Chunghwa Telecom in Taiwan charges for different types of servive. All amount are in Taiwan dollars. 1usd = 33 twd
what i started out saying before is simply screw comcast if it does not want to provide full service to their cusromers.if they want to simply provide partial service ,then i’m sure others could give us all of what we pay for , not just half! VERIZON IS GREAT!!!
VERIZON dsl kicks butt and is probably cheaper in cost as well!
they provide full service. VERIZON is excellent! they don’t attempt to interfere with loyal customers service. or interupt users enjoying a legal usage of internet services!
did we wake up in the U.S.S.R. this morning. comcast will probably go the way of the other bankrupt cable providers anyway!
hope their stockholders all relize this before its too late.
and me…i’ll advise freinds ,family, and buisness accociates of mine. i’m a union electrical contractor in the L.A.,Ca and Vegas area. and my all my builder freinds all respect my advise! while i’m fishing , eating ,drinking and being merry with my buisness associates i,ll remind them NO on comcast!
YES ON VERIZON
did i mention VERIZON?
NO…not a VERIZON rep….just a satisfied customer.
VERIZON IS GREAT!!!
Perhaps on Monday, September 10th, any Comcast customer who is unhappy with their service…should call and complain.
On Monday, September 10th, during business hours, for example.
Perhaps you know someone else who is unhappy with this practice which reduces us all to leeches and freeloaders.
Pass the word on.
Try QoS. I swear it works. Other people need to test and verify.
http://digg.com/software/Possible_solution_to_Comcast_bittorrent_throttling
[quote comment="148304"]Use Hamachi to establish giant secure virtual lans on the internet. Its free, cheap, easy.
I personally have the “bogomip” network with a private password using the Hamachi servers. I use that for my personal home to work VPN, took maybe 5 minutes to set up and get working.
If torrent sites would use hamachis P2P encrypted VPN techniques to make a large virtual lan exist, they could privately host their own websites on private networks - outside of the public eye.[/quote]
Exist already ;)
[quote comment="152286"]what i started out saying before is simply screw comcast if it does not want to provide full service to their cusromers.if they want to simply provide partial service ,then i’m sure others could give us all of what we pay for , not just half! VERIZON IS GREAT!!!
VERIZON dsl kicks butt and is probably cheaper in cost as well!
they provide full service. VERIZON is excellent! they don’t attempt to interfere with loyal customers service. or interupt users enjoying a legal usage of internet services!
did we wake up in the U.S.S.R. this morning. comcast will probably go the way of the other bankrupt cable providers anyway!
hope their stockholders all relize this before its too late.
and me…i’ll advise freinds ,family, and buisness accociates of mine. i’m a union electrical contractor in the L.A.,Ca and Vegas area. and my all my builder freinds all respect my advise! while i’m fishing , eating ,drinking and being merry with my buisness associates i,ll remind them NO on comcast!
YES ON VERIZON
did i mention VERIZON?
NO…not a VERIZON rep….just a satisfied customer.
VERIZON IS GREAT!!![/quote]
Douche, #1 Learn how to spell. #2 Just because you had bad experience don’t tell others to go to slower service.. cable modem vs. dsl
As a Comcast customer, I was really surprised when I first read this entry last night. In the few days since this entry was posted, I have had no problems seeding, though now I fear Comcast might pull this crap on my area (San Jose, CA) soon.
One of the affected in the Boston, MA area. The iptables trick does not seem to work.
Ordered Verizon FIOS yesterday. Install date in first week of Sept. So two more weeks of hell.
[quote comment="151685"][quote comment="148281"]I am as of today the 17th of August a Comcast cable internet subscriber. I’m not sure if this is affecting all Comcast or possibly untrue, but I am currently downloading/seeding without any issues. I seed on timer where day,early evening hours i upload at 32kb/s and late evening early morning at 64 kb/s and have done so for almost 2 years on a 24/7 basis with no problems from Comcast for doing so. I’ve up’d over 500 Terabytes this year so far, and that’s just in bitorrent traffic. I still use my net connection for games and surfing/email as well on top of this. I live in a smaller area so this may be the reason we aren’t affected. I can’t say anything bad about Comcast as of this time period. I had issues with sprint/earthlink dsl and their crap speeds before this but comcast has been reliable and almost always higher than rated speeds.[/quote]
You are so full of shit dude. Time to go back to math class. Even if you where running at 64K/s all year round non-stop with no breaks that only comes out to 1.88094091415405 TB/year… yeah lets see… 1.9TB vs 500TB… hmmm… STFU.[/quote]
If you’d spend more time reading and less time being an asshole you’d see I answered this once in post #83. I meant gigs NOT Tb’s. I made a mistake when making the connection between brain and fingers.
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