Cox slowing torrents?

[Technomage]

Joe wrote:
> I realize they have both been reportedly filtering and slowing torrents 
> for some time (in fact I think all ISPs reportedly do), but I've only 
> really noticed it since last night. I was chugging along maintaining 
> about 120-140kBps up as usual and all of a sudden everything dropped off 
> and I couldn't get anything up over 10kBps. I've had Cox for over a year 
> now and it's the first time I've have any issue like that.
>
> I changed my ports around and checked some sites and none of the tests 
> came back positive for filtering. Now, all of a sudden, I'm back up to 
> 120kBps again. I still have no idea if it was me or them...
>
> Thanks for the feedback though.
>
> -Joe
>
>   
Its not you.
Cox is using filtering/slowing technology. right now, they are looking 
for port specific stuff
(on the usual BT ports). I switch ports weekly to prevent this sort of 
non-sense, especially
where my game playing roomies are concerned (it gets aggravating when 
cox slows
legitimate traffic because they view it as a problem). They might change 
the tech to
look for any BT traffic on any port and "auto filter" at that point.  
Until that happens,
your best bet is to change ports periodically.

The biggest reason cox is doing this is because of irresponsible users 
on their network
who absolutely insist on using BT (and other filesharing technologies) 
for passing
copyrighted content (in direct violation of 17 USC 501 and others). 
There are other issues at
work here (including the ACTA as discussed in another thread) that have 
some bearing
on this problem as well.

Right now, for those of us who are using filesharing technology for 
legitimate uses, we
just have to keep playing the shell game of switching ports (or changing 
your interface's
MAC address and getting a new IP). Otherwise, we'll be caught in that 
over broad net that cox
tends to use to solve their problems.