A new study suggests that more than half of all Internet traffic is generated by non-human sources such as hacking software, scrapers and automated spam mechanisms. The majority of this non-human traffic, according to cloud service provider Incapsula, is potentially malicious. The study is based on data collected from 1,000 websites that utilize Incapsula’s services, and it determined that just 49% of Web traffic is human browsing. 20% is benign non-human search engine traffic, but 31% of all Internet traffic is tied to malicious activities. 19% is from ” ‘spies’ collecting competitive intelligence,” 5% is from automated hacking tools seeking out vulnerabilities, 5% is from scrapers and 2% is from content spammers. ”Few people realize how much of their traffic is non-human, and that much of it is potentially harmful,” Incapsula co-founder Marc Gaffan told ZDNet. Incapsula, coincidentally, offers services aimed at securing small and medium businesses.

Read

Sprint, a carrier that often touts itself as the only carrier with “truly unlimited” data plans, actually throttles its heaviest data users. Speaking at an investor conference on Thursday, Sprint CEO Dan Hesse admitted that Sprint imposes limits the top 1% of data hogs. “For those that want to abuse it, we can knock them off,” Hesse said. The executive explained that Sprint needs to throttle — or slow down the data speeds — of its heaviest users in order to make room for the growing number of smartphone users on its 3G and 4G WiMAX networks. Earlier on Thursday Sprint detailed its first 4G LTE markets, which will roll out in Atlanta, Dallas, Houston and San Antonio during the first half of this year.

Read

Data caps that wireless carriers and internet service providers often implement on heavy data users may not be the right solution for avoiding network congestion. Instead, ISPs and carriers should throttle data speeds to ensure solid network performance. Research firm Diffraction Analysis recently set out to discover if “data hogs” — the few people on the internet who consume more data than the general population — really do have a negative effect on the overall quality of a network. Read on for more.

The firm studied a medium-sized company in North America and tracked the data usage of its employees throughout the day. The average users on the network consumed an estimated 9.6GB of data over the course of one month, based on trends from a subset of users, and the network’s data hogs ate up 288GB. Only 14.3% of the heavy users were consuming bandwidth during peak hours, however, and just half of them were using the fastest internet connection available.

“ISP’s worldview [confuses] data consumption and bandwidth usage, i.e. how much data was downloaded over a whole period with how much bandwidth capacity was used at any given point in time,” Diffraction said in its report.

The company notes that because of the aforementioned traits of heavy users, data hogs cannot be blamed for slow throughput issues during peak hours, concluding that data consumption is generally a “poor proxy” for bandwidth usage.

[Via TechCrunch]

Read

Let’s face it… not all 4G is created equal. When Verizon Wireless’ LTE launched in its first few markets last year, bloggers and media saw blazing fast data speeds in their tests that put other 4G networks to shame. So did we. In fact, on numerous occasions and in numerous device reviews, we called Verizon’s LTE the fastest cellular data service we had ever tested. But a common sentiment rang throughout the Internet: Verizon’s 4G LTE is fast now, but that’s because the network is empty. And Verizon Wireless’ competition mirrored the opinion, of course. In a private conversation about the discrepancy in performance between Sprint’s 4G WiMAX and Verizon’s 4G LTE, a Sprint executive told me that Verizon’s network was so fast because it was empty. “Wait until it fills up,” the exec chuckled. “Then we’ll see if the ThunderBolt still deserves its name.”
(continued below)

Yes, post-3G cellular networks are important for a variety of reasons; just ask AT&T why it is currently trying to spend $39 billion to acquire T-Mobile USA. I covered some of these reasons in a recent feature. But speed is still of the utmost importance, of course, and Verizon is the undisputed king right now. It also has the youngest 4G network among major U.S. carriers, which include Sprint’s 4G WiMAX network and HSPA+ networks belonging to AT&T and T-Mobile. In my testing in New York City, where I live in Bergen County New Jersey, in San Francisco, in Dallas, and in every other 4G city I’ve visited, Verizon’s LTE network makes the competition look like dial-up.

In the beginning, the congestion argument was a good one for Verizon’s competition to make. Verizon Wireless’ LTE was brand new while other carriers had hundreds of thousands of 4G subscribers. But fast forward to today, and Verizon Wireless 4G is just as fast as ever. I performed about 20 speed tests with a Novatel Wireless 4G MiFi in and around New York City ahead of publishing this piece, and Verizon’s network is just as fast now as it was when it launched in this region. Download speeds ranged from about 6Mbps to over 22Mbps depending on the website I used to test my data speeds, and upload speeds hovered between 2Mbps and 5Mbps. Here are the results from a few of the LTE tests:

So when is the network going to slow down?

We’re half way through 2011 right now and Verizon has been unrelenting in its 4G build-out. The HTC Thunderbolt was a big seller for Verizon, racking up 260,000 activations in the first quarter of 2011, and now Samsung’s DROID Charge is one of the more popular smartphones sold by the carrier. BGR has also confirmed with multiple authorized Verizon Wireless retailers that its 4G mobile hotspots and 4G laptop dongles are among the most popular broadband accessories it sells. Long story short, the network has traffic.

Other U.S. carriers will find a million different ways to argue that their 4G networks are just as good or better than Verizon’s. Maybe Verizon doesn’t have quite as many 4G subscribers… Maybe Sprint’s network performs better in other regions… Maybe AT&T’s 4G network was having a bad day… Maybe I wasn’t sitting in the right spot wearing an aluminum foil hat and facing east when I tested T-Mobile’s HSPA+ network and that’s why peak speeds weren’t higher… Fair enough, but let’s not forget that these same carriers are currently making big investments in 4G LTE. AT&T has confirmed on numerous occasions that it will launch LTE in several markets starting this summer, and now even Sprint is reportedly beginning to invest in 4G LTE as well.

If their current 4G networks are so great, why bother?

Just as Verizon took its trailing position in the smartphone race and turned it on its head to offer what is arguably the best smartphone portfolio in the country, the nation’s top carrier is now doing the same thing with its network. CDMA was old and slow two years ago, and now it’s practically laughable. There’s nothing laughable about a 4G LTE network that consistently outperforms my wireline broadband service, however, and Sprint, AT&T and T-Mobile are stuck playing follow the leader.

4G. It’s everywhere. It’s on the tech sites you read. It’s on the televisions you watch. It’s plastered in advertisements all over the city streets you walk. It was probably in the sandwich you ate for lunch. Cellular carriers around the world are betting the bank on 4G — be it LTE, WiMAX or the newly knighted HSPA+ — and 4G-enabled gear is already starting to flood the market despite the lack of nationwide coverage.

Sprint was first to market with 4G here in the U.S. since HSPA+ was still just 3G at the time, and the carrier now has several 4G smartphones and 4G modems available for sale. Verizon Wireless is about to launch its first 4G phone, the highly anticipated HTC ThunderBolt, and AT&T will begin the process of replacing its HSPA+ 4G network with an LTE 4G network later this year. Even smaller carriers like MetroPCS are getting in on the action. In fact, MetroPCS became the first U.S. carrier to launch an LTE phone last year when it released the Samsung Craft.

Not long ago, 4G was a myth in terms of available technology. The International Telecommunication Union (ITU) defined 4G as cellular service that provides peak download speeds of approximately 100Mbps in high-mobility environments (cell phones) and peak download speeds of approximately 1Gbps in low-mobility environments. LTE, WiMAX and HSPA+ don’t even come close to fitting that definition. This is no longer the case, however. Carriers are spending billions of dollars on these next-generation technologies and millions more advertising them. And so, not surprisingly, the ITU recently shifted its position and amended its definition of 4G to include current technologies. That worked out nicely.

Semantics aside, 4G services like LTE and WiMAX are where cellular technology is headed and eventually we’ll all embrace these new networks. We know 4G is a big deal to carriers because they’re spending bucket loads of money on these technologies, but all the hype right now surrounds speed. Speed? T-Mobile’s HSPA+ is often faster than these newer 4G technologies, as we recently saw in a recent nationwide speed test. So, does 4G really matter? Cut through all the marketing, advertising, speed tests and hype, and the answer is still yes — but perhaps not solely for the reason you think.

4G networks based on LTE and WiMAX will play an important role in empowering the future of the wireless industry. Yes, they have the potential to afford speeds that exceed the limitations of older cellular technologies like CDMA, EDGE, EV-DO and HSPA, but some might consider that a benefit of lesser importance than the capability these networks have to accommodate more traffic. Just ask AT&T, which has been taking hits in mind share ever since the mass of iPhone users began crippling its data network. Of course Apple’s inexperience with building cell phones continues to play a large role in AT&T’s current situation, but that’s another article entirely.

Without getting overly technical, new 4G networks based on LTE and WiMAX make use of technologies that will better accommodate the sharp rise in cell phone usage we’re currently seeing the the U.S. and other markets. The use of technologies like Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing (OFDM) and Multiple Input Multiple Output (MIMO) antenna technology result in a more efficient use of spectrum, better signal coverage and — most importantly, perhaps — more capacity.

Think of your cellular connection as a highway. Older 3G technologies might have two or three lanes in each direction. When traffic is light, the highway is more than suitable to get you from A to B quickly, efficiently and painlessly. Problems arise as rush hour approaches, however, and it could now take hours to get to the same destination that would take just 20 minutes in light traffic.

Now, think of LTE and WiMAX as a highway that offers 10 lanes in each direction. It might have the same 65 MPH speed limit as the narrower highway, but traffic will keep moving along just fine when rush hour rolls around.

It’s far more difficult to convey this benefit in advertising, and users naturally consider speed to be of great importance — especially after being conditioned by wireline broadband services and the ISPs that provide them. As such, speed will continue to be at the forefront of all marketing messages carriers deliver to the public surrounding 4G. But rest assured, carriers need the added capacity afforded by LTE and WiMAX networks if they are to survive. Moreover, developers need the capacity so they can continue innovating, and subscribers need it so they can use all these great new services without experiencing 10 car pile-ups on a regular basis.

We’re now in the midst of rush hour and 3G highways are far too narrow to handle the congestion.

BGR has learned that AT&T may have plans to offer tiered data services when it launches its Long Term Evolution network later this year. The carrier apparently plans to trial two separate types of tiers alongside its LTE service: speed tiers and data tiers. Speed tiers will provide LTE data service at varying rates of speed depending on the plan a customer selects, similar to land-based broadband services currently offered by ISPs. Data tiers will afford subscribers “data buckets” of varying sizes, similar to the configuration of AT&T’s current data plans.

The carrier may also have plans to give subscribers the option to boost services temporarily for a fee, according to a document provided to BGR. The documents mentions “Top Up Sessions,” which allow users to increase their data allotment for the remainder of a billing cycle, and “Speed Up Sessions,” which will allow subscribers on lower-tier plans to speed up their service for a specific duration. The document does not provide any details in terms of what speeds might be afforded by each tier, nor does it detail how much data will be included with each of the various data bucket sizes. It is also currently unclear how many speed and data bucket options AT&T might intend to offer its LTE subscribers. According to the document, AT&T will begin trials of the aforementioned tiered LTE service plans in May for this year. Hit the jump for an excerpt from the internal AT&T document detailing the tiered data.

A study conducted recently by network technology firm Arieso showed that Android users move more data over cellular networks than any other group of smartphone users. The study mentions high-resolution cameras along with video recording and sharing capabilities as being among Android’s biggest bandwidth hogging features. Due to Android’s rapid growth, carriers find themselves struggling to keep up with the ever-increasing congestion on their networks. “Smartphone subscriptions are rising and so too is subscriber appetite for mobile data. It’s a trend that’s set to continue,” Arieso CTO Michael Flanagan told Reuters. The move to next-generation “4G” network technologies like WiMAX and LTE will help carriers accomodate the demand for data, but rolling out these new networks takes a tremendous amount of time and resources. Sprint began lighting up its WiMAX network last year but coverage is still very limited, and Verizon Wireless just flipped the switch on LTE in 38 cities, though it currently does not offer any LTE-compatible cell phones. AT&T and T-Mobile will not begin rolling out LTE until next year.

Read

We just got back from Sprint’s HTC EVO 4G event in NYC, and besides messing around with the device and seeing it for the second time first hand, we finally got a release date and price. As reported earlier, you’ll be able to get Android’s finest for $199 with a new two year agreement on June 4th. To recap the new data pricing, Sprint’s adding a $10 “4G” add-on feature to their $69.99 unlimited voice, data, and SMS package. Tethering (mobile hotspot) will run you an additional $29.99 monthly. All in, it tops out at $109.98 — still a pretty good deal if you think about it, especially considering the handset will support up to 8 simultaneous devices and even better, there’s no bandwidth cap at all. Check out our awesome gallery from the event complete with some HTC EVO 4G hotness sprinkled in.

Click on over to our Sprint HTC EVO 4G Event gallery!

The net neutrality movement received a huge blow today when the US Court of Appeals sided with Comcast in its claim that the Federal Communications Commission lacks legal authority to demand ISPs shape internet traffic. Over the past few years, the FCC has grown increasingly concerned that ISPs would throttle connection speeds for things such as peer-to-peer file sharing and streaming media in order to dedicate more bandwidth to services it can better capitalize on. Comcast first challenged the FCC on net neutrality in 2008 when the FCC reprimanded Comcast for throttling the connections of clients who used a large amount of bandwidth through P2P networking.

As a rule of thumb, we at BGR are not in favor of government agencies (whether independent or not) imposing rules upon industries, although in this instance we’re actually finding ourselves disappointed if only for the fact we believe net neutrality must become a reality.

Read

Ars Technica has posted an interesting article, speculating that wireless carrier network congestion (especially in the case of AT&T) may not have so much to do with how much bandwidth your device is consuming, but rather how your smartphone is connecting to the network.

Typically, when a phone needs a data connection, it makes a request via a signaling channel on your carrier’s network. The data connection is then approved, opened, and remains open in an idle state when not in use. However, iPhone, Android, and webOS devices have all employed a little trick to help conserve battery life; they drop the data connection when not in use as opposed to allowing it to idle. While end-users see this manifested as increased battery life, wireless network carriers see it manifested as a spike in signal channel traffic, especially in urban areas. “Cell nodes use signaling channels to set up the data connection, as well as signaling phone calls, SMS messages, voicemails, and more. When enough iPhones are in a particular area, these signaling channels can become overloaded—there simply aren’t enough to handle all the data requests along with all the calls and messages,” writes Ars.

It isn’t just American carriers experiencing this issue. U.K. wireless provider O2 experienced a similar problem soon after releasing the iPhone. O2 had to work with network vendors to optimize its network to allow for the dynamic handling of signal requests. However, most European carriers did tend to fair much better than their American counterparts. “Europe embraced heavy text messaging and data use far earlier than users in the US. SMS and MMS messages rely heavily on signaling channels to operate, and so networks were generally configured to dynamically manage changes in signaling traffic,” said an industry expert.

As for AT&T, scheduled backhaul improvements and over 2,000 new cell towers scheduled for 2010 should help stem the tide, but with the iPad and a litany of Android devices in the pipeline… stay tuned.

Read

With little fanfare, Comcast launched a new online file backup service called Secure Backup & Share for its broadband internet customers. The new service utilizes Mozy, an online backup solution that is currently managed by Decho Corporation, a subsidiary of EMC. Using a tool installed on your PC and soon Mac, the service will backup selected files to a secure online location that can be accessed from any web browser, including your web-enabled mobile phone. Three tiers of storage are available including the Standard 2GB plan which is free, the Preferred 50GB plan which is $4.99 monthly or $49.99 yearly, and the Premier 200GB plan which is $9.99 monthly or $99.99 yearly. Apparently Comcast forgot about its bandwidth cap and “network management techniques” when offering these plans as the 200GB plan comes dangerously close to the 250GB monthly cap and the uploading process will definitely cause you to max out your connection for more than 15 minutes which may result in your connecting being throttled. Comcast does not state whether the cap or throttling is waived for those accounts that purchase a storage plan, so we must assume that both are still in effect, a situation that certainly diminishes the attractiveness of these plans. It also begs the question, if Comcast’s network is so strained that it has to enforce a cap and utilize “network management techniques”, why are they offering a bandwidth-intensive online storage solution?

[Via CNET]

Read

Canadians with a serious need for speed might want to pack their bags and move to one of Canada’s five largest cities — Vancouver, Calgary, Toronto, Ottawa and Montreal — as today Rogers announced that its 21Mbps HSPA+ network upgrade has gone live and is ripe for the picking. Almost. No current Rogers handsets are capable of reaching such speeds, but if mobile internet is something you’re absolutely smitten with then you should definitely consider pre-ordering the new 21Mbps HSPA+ Mobile Internet Rocket Stick. It starts off at $79.99 on contract (which is $79.99 more than Rogers’ current Rocket Stick offerings), but c’mon; not owning the latest and greatest gear flies straight in the face of what we here at BGR are all about. As for the general benefits for current 3G handset owners, the upgrade also comes with an overhaul of the network’s backend, meaning more people should be able to simultaneously use data without making the network come to a screeching halt.

Read

As part of the sanction by the FCC for its package hijacking of BitTorrent traffic, Comcast was ordered to file a new network management plan with the FCC by midnight Friday. Comcast complied with the order and announced that it would use bandwidth throttling a new congestion management technique as its new network management plan:

It will identify which customer accounts are using the greatest amounts of bandwidth and their Internet traffic will be temporarily managed until the period of congestion passes. Customers will still be able to do anything they want to online, and many activities will be unaffected, but managed customers could experience things like: longer times to download or upload files, surfing the Web may seem somewhat slower, or playing games online may seem somewhat sluggish.

This protocol-agnostic bandwidth throttling plan is expected to be deployed nationwide by the end of December 2008. With its 250GB cap set to go live in October and now bandwidth throttling on tap for December, it looks like we will not be having a Comcastic Day.

Read

Directly inline with rumors that made their way around the web a few months ago, Comcast has confirmed that it will employ a residential consumer bandwidth cap beginning October 1st of this year. Now before you start going too crazy, it should be noted that the cap will stand at 250 GB. 250 GB is most definitely more than enough for the typical to highly-active range of internet users. Once you pass over 250 GB per month of bandwidth you would definitely be best served by getting out more. In fact, Comcast states that the median monthly data usage amongst its customers is between 2 and 3 GB. The site puts 250 GB into perspective as such:

* Send 50 million emails (at 0.05 KB/email)
* Download 62,500 songs (at 4 MB/song)
* Download 125 standard-definition movies (at 2 GB/movie)
* Upload 25,000 hi-resolution digital photos (at 10 MB/photo)

50 million 0.05 KB emails. What kind of measurement is that? Anyway, while there is no mention of overage fees in Comcast’s new terms it is rumored that subscribers who surpass the cap a certain number of times may be subject to service suspensions or termination. Hey, at least Comcast customers can be thankful they’re not stuck with one of the other ISPs employing caps as low as 5 GB…

[Via DLSReports]

Read