YouTube, Netflix Videos Found to Be Slowed by Wireless Carriers
The largest U.S. telecom companies are slowing internet traffic to and from popular apps like YouTube and Netflix, according to new research from Northeastern University and the University of Massachusetts, Amherst. The researchers used a smartphone app called Wehe, downloaded by about 100,000 consumers, to monitor which mobile services are being throttled when and by whom, in what likely is the single largest running study of its kind.
Among U.S. wireless carriers, YouTube is the No. 1 target of throttling, where data speeds are slowed, according to the data. Netflix Inc.'s video streaming service, Amazon.com Inc.'s Prime Video and the NBC Sports app have been degraded in similar ways, according to David Choffnes, one of the study's authors who developed the Wehe app.
From January through early May, the app detected "differentiation" by Verizon Communications Inc. more than 11,100 times, according to the study. This is when a type of traffic on a network is treated differently than other types of traffic. Most of this activity is throttling. AT&T Inc. did this 8,398 times and it was spotted almost 3,900 times on the network of T-Mobile US Inc. and 339 times on Sprint Corp.'s network, the study found. The numbers are partly influenced by the size of the networks and user bases. C Spire, a smaller privately held wireless operator, had the fewest instances of differentiation among U.S. providers, while Verizon had the most.
Also at Marketing Land.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday September 14 2018, @12:20AM (2 children)
Why would they care? In most areas there's at most 2 choices of ISP and chances are that both of them are going to engage in this kind of rent seeking behavior before too long. At which point, there's not really anything that the customer can do as they're unlikely to move just because of terrible internet.
(Score: 3, Informative) by bzipitidoo on Friday September 14 2018, @01:58AM (1 child)
Such learned helplessness!
Tell you what we can do. Municipal broadband, that's what. If the telco monopolies get too greedy, there will be a backlash.
And know what else is fun about throttling legit services? Yarrr, me hearties, piracy be looking popular again! Torrents ahoy! alt.binaries ho! I'd love to see the MAFIAA sue the telcos for, what's the legal term? Contributory infringement, yes.
And, you know, there's still the library. These days, most public libraries do have movie collections available for borrowing.
(Score: 2) by darkfeline on Tuesday September 18 2018, @06:23AM
>Municipal broadband, that's what.
ISPs have made that illegal through exclusive contracts or lobbying.
>These days, most public libraries do have movie collections available for borrowing.
Not for long, I suspect. Libraries used to have a lot of freedom in preserving digital media, but some people don't like that very much. Nintendo is a recent example.
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