Zeroization

Google-sponsored M-Lab or Measurement Labs is a project that provide tools and research on Internet connectivity. Currently there are three tools in the suite, a general Network Diagnostic Tool for detecting issue that might limit network connection speed. Glastnost can help you determine whether your ISP is throttling or blocking BitTorrent traffic.  The also provide a tool for Network Path and Application Diagnosis. More tools are in the works.

The tools are all Java and fairly easy to use. I gave Glasnost a try and here is what I saw (apparently, my ISP does not block BitTorrent traffic at this time.)

Is BitTorrent traffic on a well-known BitTorrent port (6887) throttled?

The BitTorrent upload (seeding) worked. Our tool was successful in uploading data using the BitTorrent protocol.

There’s no indication that your ISP rate limits your BitTorrent uploads. In our tests a TCP upload achieved minimal 629 Kbps while a BitTorrent upload achieved maximal 757 Kbps.

The BitTorrent download worked. Our tool was successful in downloading data using the BitTorrent protocol.

There’s no indication that your ISP rate limits your BitTorrent downloads. In our tests a TCP download achieved minimal 1782 Kbps while a BitTorrent download achieved maximal 1880 Kbps.

Is BitTorrent traffic on a non-standard BitTorrent port (10015) throttled?

The BitTorrent upload (seeding) worked. Our tool was successful in uploading data using the BitTorrent protocol.

There’s no indication that your ISP rate limits your BitTorrent uploads. In our tests a TCP download achieved minimal 638 Kbps while a BitTorrent download achieved maximal 709 Kbps.

The BitTorrent download worked. Our tool was successful in downloading data using the BitTorrent protocol.

There’s no indication that your ISP rate limits your BitTorrent downloads. In our tests a TCP download achieved minimal 1319 Kbps while a BitTorrent download achieved maximal 1991 Kbps.

Is TCP traffic on a well-known BitTorrent port (6887) throttled?

There’s no indication that your ISP rate limits all downloads at port 6887. In our test, a TCP download on a BitTorrent port achieved at least 1782 Kbps while a TCP download on a non-BitTorrent port achieved at least 1319 Kbps.

There’s no indication that your ISP rate limits all uploads at port 6887. In our test, a TCP upload on a BitTorrent port achieved at least 629 Kbps while a TCP upload on a non-BitTorrent port achieved at least 638 Kbps.

They also provide a readout of who is blocking the traffic and where. Most of the reported blocking (US) is occuring in Cox and Comcast controlled networks.