Article 43
Broadband Privacy
Friday, September 03, 2010
Sonic Net
An ISP that knows nothing of “data hogs”
By Nate Anderson
ARS Technica
September 3, 2010
Pop quizwhich US Internet service provider made the following statement about a network upgrade?
During the construction of this network we have given a lot of thought… to the business model in the US, and how we could do things in a different and more interesting way. The natural model when you have a simple duopoly capturing the majority of the market is segmentation: maximize ARPU [average revenue per user] by artificially limiting service in order to drive additional monthly spending. But fundamentally this is the wrong model for a service provider like us, and we have looked to Europe for inspiration. The model pioneered by Iliad under the Free brand is a better fit, both for us and for our customers.
As the marginal cost of providing more bandwidth or less, and providing POTS voice or not are both minimal, we have adopted a simple flat rate model instead of the more typical US model of “$5 more goes faster"… I believe that removing the artificial limits on speed, and including home phone with the product are both very exciting.
Yeah… it wasn’t one of the major ISPs. Instead, it was Sonic.net, California’s largest indie ISP. The company has been in business since 1994, but the FCC’s eventual decision to deregulate wholesale broadband services put the company in a tough spot, where it couldn’t access the highest-speed components of the network at a competitive price. So Sonic.net has been building out its own “facilities-based” network around San Francisco, though it still requires access to the telco-controlled copper local loop to a customer’s home.
The new network, called Fusion, allows Sonic.net to offer ADSL2+ service along with its own telephone service (this isn’t VoIP, but actual POTS). The company currently sells one offering to residential users through Fusion: for $50 a month, they get uncapped ADSL that runs as fast as their line can handle (up to 20Mbps) along with free nationwide phone service. Users who want more bandwidth can order up a second telephone line and “bond” the two for speeds of up to 40Mbps by simply paying another $50.
Sonic.net CEO Dane Jasper explained his unorthodox approach to selling broadband in a discussion this week with Benoit Felten, a Yankee Group broadband analyst, on Felten’s private blog. Felten, who’s based in Europe, notes that the US market “is often considered to be a static duopoly,” but he points to initiatives from ISPs like Sonic.net as refreshing alternatives.
“In an era where the buzzwords about broadband and the internet seem to be caps and hogs,” he notes, “it’s reassuring and exciting to see someone trying to buck the trend and offer what customers want as opposed to what he thinks customers should get.”
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Saturday, August 07, 2010
The Mother of All Privacy Battles Part 20 - Google/Verizon Deal
What next?
Susan Crawford’s Blog
August 5, 2010
Heres the big picture:
The Internet is becoming our common medium, replacing telephone, broadcast, and every other form of communication.
We used to have the idea that basic communications transport should be nondiscriminatory - open to all, a basic input into economic life. When you turn on your air conditioner this hot summer, you expect it will work. It just plugs into the grid using a standard interface. Communications used to be treated this way as well.
This idea has been thrown out the windowby the deregulation of high-speed Internet access over the last eight years. Telephones are going out of style, and the new world replacing it has no requirement of a standard interface over which any business can function.
At the same time, we have an extraordinarily concentrated market in high-speed Internet access. This means that competitors can’t constrain the abuses (potential or actual) of network access providers. Carriers have every incentive to strike exclusive deals prioritizing particular communications - anything to be treated as just a pipe - and to maintain the illusion of scarcity that allows them to charge high prices for communications transport.
Over the last eight years, weve tried the deregulatory route. It hasn’t worked well for America. Weve got relatively high prices and slow speeds compared to the rest of the world, and the carriers are maintaining their moats of comparative advantages that allow them to stave off competition from new entrants.
This isn’t good for consumers, entrepreneurs, innovators, or the American economy. It’s not good for the next small company that wants to launch a business online without paying twice - once to publish its wares, and again to reach high-speed Internet access users via a discriminating carrier. (This isn’t good for the content industry in the long term, by the way - theyll have to pay too.)
The FCC has an opportunity to act to reclassify high-speed Internet access in September, and should do so in the public interest. The public has an interest in lower prices and neutral/ubiquitous Internet access, as well as in a level playing field for new innovators. Without regulatory authority, the FCC won’t be able to ensure that the market provides any of these public goods. Just think electrical grid; this public interest is anything but surprising.
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Here’s what Rep. Markey had to say about today’s news of a GOOGLE/VERIZON deal:
The potential deal between two broadband behemoths underscores the need for the FCC to act quickly to protect the free and open Internet. In the absence of such action, it’s increasingly clear that cozy cooperation between communications colossi will reign on the Internet. No one should be surprised that SUCH COMPANIES will seek to slant the playing field in their favor, a result that will stifle the next generation of Internet innovators and short-circuit the economic benefits needed to power our economy in the 21st century. It is time for the FCC to step in to protect consumers, innovation, and fair competition.
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Verizon & Google Enter Reported Deal for Tiered Internet Use, Is Net Neutrality in Jeopardy?
Democracy Now
August 6, 2010
The internet and telecom giants Verizon and Google have reportedly reached an agreement to impose a tiered system for accessing the internet. The deal would enable Verizon to charge for quicker access to online content over wireless devices, a violation of the concept of net neutrality that calls for equal access to all services. The deal comes amidst closed-door meetings between the Federal Communications Commission and major telecom giants on crafting new regulations.
JUAN GONZALEZ: We begin today with news about the reported deal between internet and telecom giants Google and Verizon that many fear could spell the end of the internet as we know it. The two corporations were reported to have reached an agreement to impose a tiered system for accessing the internet. The deal would enable Verizon to charge for quicker access to online content over wireless devices, a violation of the concept of net neutrality that calls for equal access to all services.
Both firms denied they were close to an agreement that would lead to a, quote, “two-tier internet.” In statements, both Google and Verizon reiterated their commitment to an open internet.
AMY GOODMAN: Meanwhile, the Federal Communications Commission has called off its closed-door negotiations with major telecom giants on crafting these new regulations and pledged to seek broader input. FCC Chair Julius Genachowski said, quote, “Any outcome, any deal that doesnt preserve the freedom and openness of the internet for consumers and entrepreneurs will be unacceptable.”
Well, for more on this story, weҒre joined from Chicopee, Massachusetts, by Josh Silver, the executive director of Free Press, [freepress.net], a national media reform organization.
Josh, welcome to Democracy Now!
JOSH SILVER: Thank you.
AMY GOODMAN: What are your major concerns, and whats the latest you’ve heard on this reported deal?
JOSH SILVER: Well, before I answer that question, I want to back up a little bit and get to this idea of net neutrality, which so many Americans, so many viewers and listeners to your show, probably think, well, that maybe that’s just for geeks. The reason net neutrality matters it’s been the law of the land for the internet since it was created about forty years agothis is the principle that says all content on the web travels at the same speed, whether it’s ABC News sending it or its Democracy Now! or it’s your cousins wedding video. And the key there is understanding that as internet speed increases, then we’re going to see all mediatelevision, radio, phone service, emerging technologiesחall delivered through an internet connection. Any website could become a television network or a radio network. Its a complete game changer that breaks open access and distribution of media content. So, when we have the changes in policy deals like the Google-Verizon deal that we’re going to talk about today, this is going to have a profound effect over whether that revolutionary sort of opportunity is realized or whether its going to be squandered.
Now, with the Google-Verizon deal, there is an interesting backdrop to all this. First of all, the United States is slipping perilously behind other nations in internet speed and adoption. We’ve gone from fourth to twenty-second in the last ten years, because of failed hands-off policies, the same kind of policies that led us into the financial crisis, same kind of policies that led to the Gulf of Mexico spill, sort of, you know, government saying, “Go ahead, industry. Do whatever you want.” And guess what? Consumers get the bad side of the deal.
In April of this year, an astounding thing happened. Because of moves made by the Bush FCC, the current Federal Communications Commission was stripped of all authority to regulate the internet, to regulateor not just the internet, but the internet service providers - a key distinction. They are no longer able to say, “Hey, Verizon, hey, AT&T, thats not fair. You can’t price gouge consumers. You cant indiscriminately block content.” And that comes in the backdrop of a president who had said during the campaign, President Obama, “I am a fierce advocate of net neutrality,” and then he appointed an FCC chairman, the current chairman, Julius Genachowski, as you mentioned, an avowed net neutrality supporter. But then things got - started to get really strange. Over the past couple of months, Chairman Genachowski pulled industry leaders into his offices, no public interest groups, and said, “Im not going to make a move to reassert my agency’s authority, even though that would be an easy thing for me to do. Instead, Im going to ask you industry players to broker a deal and try to create a compromise that we can all live with. And I’m not going to worry so much about the public interest groups.” At least, thats how it felt from here.
And so, now we’re in this strange limbo where the FCC chairman is sitting on his hands. He’s not reasserting the authority of his agency that’s needed to protect net neutrality and bring competition and drive down prices and get universal broadband to every American. And weve got Google and Verizon, who, amidst this, announced a deal unexpectedly this week - there had been rumors of it, certainly didn’t think it was going to happen so quickly - a deal that would essentially say, “OK, its going to be alright if we actually block or slow down content in the wireless space. And in the wired connections to the home or to businesses, we can sort of have something called ‘managed services,’ which lets us slow and discriminate content as we see fit.” And part of what’s so remarkable about this, Google, for the last five years, during this epic battle over net neutrality, Google has sided with the public interest groups and with other internet companies like Skype and Verizonor, excuse me, Skype and Amazon and eBay and others to support net neutrality and support consumers. So, them, this giant elephant.
JUAN GONZALEZ: Josh, I just want to interrupt for one second. Before we get to the Google-Verizon deal, I want to backtrack a little bit to the net neutrality issue, as you defined it. The argument of the telecom companies has obviously beenand the cable companiesח"Hey, these are our pipes. Why shouldnt the people who hog more bandwidth and use up more of the bandwidth on our pipes be charged more for what they do?”
JOSH SILVER: Well, here’s the problem, Juan. In the United States, we have an incredibly uncompetitive market. And as a result, we pay the American consumer pays far more money - orders of magnitude more money, for much slower service than in countries like Denmark or Japan or France or England. And so, what weve got is an uncompetitive market with two or fewer internet service providers in 97, 98 percent of markets across the country. And so, consumers don’t have choices. So if, lets say, that your Verizon provider is blocking or slowing down traffic, and you don’t like it, you dont really have a choice. That’s problem number one. Number two, you know, losing net neutrality then allows these companies to prioritize some trafficvideo, sayחand de-prioritize others, and then what effectively happens is the internet becomes like cable television, where Verizon, AT&T, Comcast and Time Warner Cable decide whats fast, whatҒshow much it costs, and whoגs slow. And you suddenly have the exact same problem we have with cable, with lack of access and distribution for regular people.
JUAN GONZALEZ: Now, do you think there may have been some navet or errors on the part of the consumer advocates in this alliance that禍s been in existence now for several years, with companies like Google and the eBays of the world, that there was a sense that they would stick up for the right thing on the issue of net neutrality, but now that its become - the proper price that they like has apparently been offered by Verizon, theyre now willing to desert the advocates and move over to a deal with the telecom companies?
JOSH SILVER: No, I think, at the time, it certainly was a smart tactical decision. Remember, we had a presidential candidate in Obama that literally said, “I will take a backseat to no one for net neutrality.” Those are strong words. And suddenly we have all these powerful industry players echoing that sentiment and agreeing specific - with the identical policy that the public interest community wanted. Everybody thought that when Julius Genachowski took over the Federal Communications Commission, he would quickly pass a net neutrality rule and solve this problem and make good on the President’s promises. It is a testament to the massive lobbying clout of the telephone and cable companies that this has happened, that this FCC chairman - certainly unexcusable, but it explains why hes sitting on his hands, although it really is to the surprise to all of us. We all thought that this would not be a problem by now. Nobody expected the court case in April that took away the agency’s authority. Many people are not talking about the fact that it would be very easy for Chairman Genachowskihe has the votes - to simply move whats called a reclassification of agency authority, and he could reestablish his authority at the agency, and we can solve this problem.
And what’s really the most alarming thing, Juan, is the fact that what were seeing is the same old same old, the same kind of approach to policy making and regulation that we saw in the run-up to the financial crisis, the same kind of oversight that we saw with the oil spill. It’s the same kind of money in politics kind of running the show and running the table in Washington. And at some point, we have to stop it, because the fact is, if we cant deal with this money-in-politics problem and the campaign finance problem, and if we cannot ensure quality journalism and access to information for the American people, we have no democracy. It will not work. And those are the two lynchpins of our current democracy, and every problem with every other issue circle back to them. Fortunately, especially with this internet issue, there is something you can do. You can go to SAVE THE INTERNET WEBSITE. You can take action, join millions of people who get it and are starting to get involved.
JUAN GONZALEZ: And what about Congress, the overwhelmingly Democratic Congress? Is there any hope that Congress can step in and right what’s occurred right now and be able to put some limits on these deals that are being put together by Google and Verizon and the other companies?
JOSH SILVER: The reason Congress cant act on this in a way thatҒs reliable is the same reason that the healthcare bill got glutted with loopholes. The telephone and telecom industry is second only to big pharmaceutical in Washington spending. They run the table with the US Congress, and its well known in town. The fact is, is that we had all but one House Republican vote against the FCC having any authority over internet service providers. We had seventy-four Democrats from the House come out and say no agency authority. These are folks that are really doing whatever the phone companies tell them to. And so, if you leave this to Congress, you can be certain that, if there is any legislation, it too will be riddled with loopholes, and the consumers will pay.
AMY GOODMAN: Finally, Google is denying this. They said, “We have not had any conversations with Verizon about paying for carriage of Google traffic. We remain as committed as we always have been to an open internet.” Josh Silver, your response?
JOSH SILVER: Those are bogus and expected denials. They also - it should be noted, they’ve been very opaque. They’ve been in short statements and in Twitter feeds. The fact is, is that what Google is saying is almost like saying, “We dont want to sell cigarettes to nine-year-olds, but we want to be able to sell cigarettes to nine-year-olds if we decide to.” That’s the analogy that you could use in this case.
AMY GOODMAN: And Googles slogan, “Do no evil”?
JOSH SILVER: I think itҒs over. The era of Google doing no evil just ended at the moment of this deal. Now, there is a possibility theyre going to change the terms of this deal, which has yet to be announced - its expected itҒll be announced on Mondaybut if they go ahead with this, Google is joining the ranks of the evil corporations that will do anything to make a profit at the consumerגs expense.
AMY GOODMAN: Josh Silver, we want to thank you for being with us, president and CEO of FREE PRESS.
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A Net Game for Google?
By Robert X. Cringely
August 7, 2010
MY three young sons never hit each other. They may poke, push, graze, bump or even slap, but they never hit, because Mom says hitting isnt allowed. This same semantic technique fits the mind-set of technology companies like Google. The geekier these companies are, the more tactical is their use of language.
And so in last week’s controversy over whether Google and Verizon are hatching a deal to undermine net neutrality, it pays to look closely at their words. Both companies maintain that there is no deal and that no money will be paid for faster transmission of data. This is probably true in a literal sense, though something is clearly happening between the companies. I think Google has just found a way to fool Mom.
Net neutrality is the concept that all data packets are created equal and Internet service providers should not give priority to one kind of data (say, video conferencing) over another (say, e-mail). Internet partisans love net neutrality while telephone companies tend not to. Why not allow e-mail to run a little slower, they argue, if that lets services that need higher performance run faster? The difference is payment: users and the Federal Communications Commission worry that once a differentiation is made, the service providers will start charging for faster service and poorer users will suffer as a result. Its a slippery slope.
Google has always been firmly on the side of net neutrality. So the news of a deal between Google and Verizon - one of the countrys largest broadband service providers - has caused consternation throughout geekdom. Has Google turned on its principles? The company says no, but then Eric Schmidt, its chief executive, has been making murky statements differentiating between wireless and wired data, suggesting to some a repudiation of neutrality. The truth is probably that Google has found a way to get special treatment from Verizon but without actually compromising net neutrality.
To see how it could work, you need to know a little about Googles network of data centers, those windowless buildings around the country containing the servers that answer search queries, show maps, provide e-mail service and download YouTube videos. Several years ago, the company found a way to build a data center quickly and easily by simply filling a warehouse with stacked shipping containers - each one filled with computers. You just plug the containers together and flip the switch. Clever.
Google actually borrowed the shipping container concept from The Internet Archive, a digital library, which envisioned using such containers to replicate its archive in locations all around the world. Once Larry Page, a co-founder of Google, learned how they could work, he saw shipping containers as a way for Google, too, to get its data closer to users.
Proximity to users is important because of the way that data moves around the Internet by hopping from one router to another. Each router looks at the packet of data and sends it on in the appropriate direction; the average data packet hops 18 times as it makes its way across the Internet. Because each hop takes time ח only a matter of milliseconds, but still measurable time the best way to speed transmission is to reduce the hops. This can be done either by creating a figurative fast lane, which violates net neutrality, or by simply putting the data closer to the user, which doesnגt.
Googles agreement with Verizon could very well be merely a way for Google to get its data closer to users, by dropping its shipping containers into Verizon data centers, or perhaps their parking lots. The phone company’s data centers, after all, are typically only one or two hops from Internet users.
With servers so close to users, Google could not only send its data faster but also avoid sending it over the Internet backbone that connects service providers and for which they all pay. This would save space for other traffic and money for both Verizon and Google, as their backbone bills decline (wishful thinking, but theoretically possible). Net neutrality would be not only intact, but enhanced.
Ideally, Google would pay Verizon not for priority carriage but for holding and powering its shipping containers. And the differentiation between wired and wireless networks may well be about the phone company not wanting to give shipping container access to its wireless data centers, since they could flood the limited wireless capacity.
Why wouldn’t the companies just tell us what theyre up to? If my guess is right, then I would think they’re silent because its a secret. They’d rather their competitors not know until a few hundred shipping containers are in place and suddenly YouTube looks more like HBO.
Don’t tell Mom.
Robert X. Cringely is the author of the blog I, Cringely.Ӕ
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Tuesday, May 18, 2010
It’s all about money
Written by Kimberly
Stop Malvertising
May 17, 2010
For the past days Facebook has been in the news for different reasons. I decided to pick out a couple of interesting articles, hoping that after reading you start ask yourself what is more important:
Stay in touch with friends, colleagues, family or share your privacy details with millions of people you never heard of?
My choice would be fairly simple: I dont want to share ALL my personal details with millions of people. I certainly donҒt want them to be exploited by an unknown individual to serve his own purposes which is making thousands of dollars income by trading or selling those PRIVATE details.
Enjoy the reading and hopefully you will think twice before staying on Facebook.
Is FaceBook A Utility
However, Facebook has one attribute that some of its competitors do not, access to some of our private information. That is the information that Facebook wants to monetize. That is what has us upset. This is what people will clamor to regulate.
Facebook is seeking to trade that for the price of our personal privacy. A price it hopes that others value more than we do. However, it has done that through what appears to many to be a bait-and-switch operation. That is what has people upset. It is not the bargain they signed up for. It is not what they were promised.
Are users “dumb fucks” for trusting data to Facebook?
By Tim Edwards
May 14, 2010
The situation was inflamed when Silicon Alley Insider posted an old instant messaging conversation between Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg and a friend in which the then 19-year-old Harvard student called users of his newly founded website ‘dumb fucks’.
During the conversation, Zuckerberg writes: “Yeah so if you ever need info about anyone at Harvard, just ask. I have over 4,000 emails, pictures, addresses, SNS.”
When the friend asks him how he got the information, Zuckerberg replies: “People just submitted it. I don’t know why. They ‘trust me’. Dumb fucks.”
Facebook responded to the publication of the ‘dumb fucks’ message, saying: “The privacy and security of our users’ information is of paramount importance to us. We’re not going to debate claims from anonymous sources or dated allegations that attempt to characterise Mark’s and Facebook’s views towards privacy.”
Want privacy on the web?
Facebook’s recent changes go too far. Protect your information by signing the petition: “Sites like Facebook must respect my privacy. They should not share information about me or my friends with other companies without my explicit permission”.
Did you see what Facebook is trying to do?
Facebook recently made a number of changes to its privacy policy that make your profile information public - even if you thought it wasn’t. Many people aren’t even aware of these changes. So we put together a chart to show you what these changes mean for protecting your information.
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Wednesday, May 12, 2010
The Mother of All Privacy Battles Part 19 - Telco Smear Campaigns
Telecoms Secret Plan To Attack Net Neutrality: Target Video Gamers And Stoke Fear Of Chinese Censorship
By Lee Fang
Think Progress
May 11, 2010
Net neutrality, a guiding principle for preserving a free and fair Internet, means that Internet service providers are not allowed to discriminate based on content for its customers. However, telecommunications firms җ like AT&T, Verizon, Comcast and others are firmly against net neutrality because they would like to increase their profits by deciding which websites customers can see, and at what speed. The telecom industry has dumped hundreds of millions of dollars into a lobby campaign against net neutrality. As the FCC now takes up net neutrality rule making, the industry is pushing an דoutside approach of hiring front groups and astroturf operatives.
This morning, representatives from various front groups launched a new coordinated campaign to kill net neutrality. Speaking on Capitol Hill, these front groups took turns decrying the evils of the principle of a fair and unbiased Internet. LULAC, which is funded by AT&T, called Net Neutrality Obamacare for the Internet. Americans for Prosperity a corporate front group founded by oil billionaire David Koch but also funded by telecom interests - unveiled a new ad smearing net neutrality as a government takeover (the initial ad buy is $1.4 million dollars). And Grover Norquist, representing his Americans for Tax Reform corporate front group, said net neutrality is like what China does, putting policemen on every corner, on the street or on the Internet. WATCH IT HERE.
ThinkProgress has obtained a PowerPoint documentwhich reveals how the telecom industry is orchestrating the latest campaign against Net Neutrality. Authored by representatives from the Atlas Network a shell think tank used to coordinate corporate front group efforts worldwide ח the documentlays out the following strategy:
- Slides 7-8 calls for the campaign to target libertarian minded internet users and video gamers and social conservative activists with anti-government messages and a rebranding of net neutrality as Net Brutality.
- Slide 9 calls for a strategy of creating a Chinese blog to compare net neutrality to Chinese government censorship, outreach via social networking platforms like Twitter and Facebook.
- Slides 10-11 detail how representatives met at Grover Norquist’s infamous Wednesday morning meeting to orchestrate the new campaign. Norquist is known to use his Wednesday meetings to plot strategy and conservative coalition building towards lobbying goals.
The PowerPoint was created on April 14th, shortly before the campaign website officially launched. The Net BrutalityӔ website relies heavily on Americans for Prosperity sources, as well as a website called NetCompetition.org which is openly funded by the American Cable Association, At&T, Comcast, and the US Telecom Association.
During the Jack Abramoff investigation, Norquist was exposed for selling support from his front groups to corporations. In one damning e-mail, Norquist is promised $50,000 dollars in exchange for providing his Americans for Tax Reform support to one of Abramoffגs clients. Today, Norquist was not only parroting the PowerPoint talking points at the press conference, but he also brought in other key conservative movement leaders and Republican lawmakers to the event.
In addition to the front groups, the loudest voice against net neutrality is still Glenn Beck, who has smeared free Internet proponents as Marxists and Communists, and has adopted the attack that net neutrality constitutes a government takeover.Ӕ However, it is important to realize that even Beck is being fed with opposition research dug up by operatives at Americans for Prosperity. This research document, compiled by Americans for Prosperity staffers, lays out point by point the attacks Beck has used in the past few weeks to disparage net neutrality supporters. If Beck picks up this new outreach to video game enthusiasts and the false comparison to Chinese censorship, then the impact of the Net BrutalityӔ PowerPoint will be even more apparent.
Telecom firms like AT&T and Verizon are among the most profitable in the world, yet America lags behind other countries in terms of broadband access and speed. Instead of dumping lobbying money into anti-net neutrality front groups and fear-mongering campaigns, the telecom industry should invest in improving service and accessibility.
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Saturday, April 10, 2010
Next Level DPI
Free Press Calls on FCC to Investigate Windstreams Search Practices
ISP’s Alleged Hijacking of User Searches Demonstrates Urgent Need for Net Neutrality and Greater Transparency
By Lynne Rose
FREE PRESS
April 2, 2010
Windstream Communications, a mid-size DSL Internet service provider, is believed to be HIJACKING USER SEARCH QUERIES MADE THROUGH THE FIREFOX BROSWER’S SEARCH TASK BAR, according to news reports and user comments. Windstream appears to be intercepting valid search queries entered via the Firefox tool bar, using either deep packet inspection technology or software installed on local computers by Windstream, and redirecting users to a search engine on a Windstream-owned page.
S. Derek Turner, research director at Free Press, made the following statement:
“We are still waiting for all the facts to come in, but if initial allegations are true, Windstream has crossed the line and is actively interfering with its subscribers’ Internet communications. Hijacking a search query is not much different from deliberately redirecting a user from NYTimes.com to WashingtonPost.com, and a limited ‘opt-out’ capability is not enough to justify Internet discrimination. This is further proof of the need for strong open Internet rules, comprehensive transparency and disclosure obligations, and a process for relief at the FCC.
“We hope the FCC will investigate Windstream’s practices immediately, and move expeditiously to pass open Internet rules without loopholes allowing pernicious activity such as the alleged search engine hijacking.”
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Windstream in windstorm over ISP’s search redirects
By Matthew Lasar
ARS Technica
April 6, 2010
Responding to a medium-sized uproar, Windstream Communications says it is sorry about those CUSTOMER SEARCHES performed by Firefox users and redirected from Google to IT’S OWN SEARCH ENGINE, and the Little Rock, Arkansas-based ISP has now got the situation under control.
“Windstream implemented a network change on Friday, April 2 that affected certain customer Web browser search box queries, producing search results inconsistent with Windstream’s prior practices,” a spokesperson for the voice/DSL service told us. “Windstream successfully implemented configuration changes today to restore original functionality to these search queries after hearing from affected customers.”
The question, of course, is whether the company accidentally or deliberately rigged its network software to produce those “inconsistent” results. We asked, but not surprisingly didn’t get an answer to that query.
Not the behavior I expect
As ARS readers know, there’s money to be made from the typing errors of Web users. Input a slight misspelling of a popular domain name and you’ll wind up at an ad-saturated site designed to harvest all such instances. Then there are the Internet service providers that take this business one step further. Screw up a domain by a single character and you wind up at an ISP-sponsored or -partnered search engine, complete with ads on the site waiting for your impression or click.
It appears that Windstream inadvertently or deliberately took this activity to the next level, according to its own statement and the complaints of some of its customers, reproduced on the Windstream forum page of DSL Reports. Here’s one protest:
“Dear Windstream,
For future reference: When I use google via the firefox search bar I actually want to go to google not searchredirect.windstream.netThis redirect happens in both windows and linux even if dns is hard set in router and tcp/ip settings
It took me 45 minutes to figure out how to disable this ‘feature’
searchredirect.windstream.net/prefs.php you can disable this ‘feature’ here
Honestly this isn’t the kind of behavior I expect out of my isp and I consider it very unprofessional.”
To these forum concerns a Windstream support person initially posted this reply: “We apologize as this is an issue that we are aware of and are currently working to resolve. You should not be getting that redirect page when you are doing your searches. We should have this resolved soon.” Next Windstream’s Twitter page declared the problem is fixed: “Windstream has resolved unintentional issues with Firefox search. Apologies for the troubles you’ve had.”
But this episode raises some serious worries, among them: how much should your ISP be allowed to monkey around with your Web browsing activity under any circumstances? Free Press has already called for the Federal Communications Commission to investigate this affair.
“If initial allegations are true, Windstream has crossed the line and is actively interfering with its subscribers’ Internet communications,” the reform groups’ S. Derek Turner declared. “Hijacking a search query is not much different than deliberately redirectingђ a user from NYTimes.com to WashingtonPost.com and a limited ‘opt-out’ capability is not enough to justify Internet discrimination. This is further proof of the need for strong open Internet rules, comprehensive transparency and disclosure obligations, and a process for relief at the FCC.”
The issue has been resolved
ARS asked Windstream about these concerns. Not surprisingly, the ISP isn’t crazy about the probe idea. “We don’t think an investigation is necessary since the issue has been resolved,” the company told Ars.
In truth, WE’D BE A BIT SURPRISED if the FCC jumped on this conundrum too quickly. Everybody’s waiting to hear what the DC Circuit Court of Appeals has to say about the Commission’s authority to sanction Comcast for P2P blocking, and most observers don’t expect it to go well for the agency [update: the court has ruled]. As the Free Press statement suggests, the FCC’s authority around these ISP issues is still a work in progress.
But given that ICANN has already condemned the practice of ISP redirection in the case of misspelled or nonexistent domain names, it doesn’t seem like we’ve heard the last about this issue. Indeed, Windstream’s quick response to subscriber complaints suggests the service knows that the watchdogs are watching. Windstream’s latest repairs of its search system “do not require customers who chose to opt-out to do so again,” the ISP assured us.
Section Privacy And Rights • Section Broadband Privacy •
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