Radware Launches an SDN-based Ultra Scalable Traffic Steering Solution

Radware expands its SDN products (see "Radware: Use SDN to Provide DDoS Protection" - here) with the availability of ".. ElasticScale, a new SDN-based network service scalability solution that enables carriers and service providers to dynamically scale-out and scale-in network services throughout their networks .. ElasticScale is the only solution in the industry to address all three aspects of network service scalability: virtual appliance provisioning, traffic distribution across virtual appliances, and acceleration of virtual appliance I/O.

Features and benefits of Radware’s ElasticScale solution includes:

• Ultra scalable traffic steering solution (100’s of Gbps)
• Ultra scalable load balancing solution
• Based on industry leading, carrier grade Alteon load balancing product line
• Support for leading hypervisors (oXen/KVM/Hyper-V/ESXi)
• Compatible with leading SDN controllers such as  OpenDaylight [see "SDN Gets Standards and Open Source" - here], Cisco XNC and NEC ProgrammableFlow
• Seamless integration with OpenStack and vCloud Director
• Runs over any physical SDN network equipment"

See "Radware Announces ElasticScale SDN-Based Network Service Scalability Solution" - here.

$1M Traffic Management Win for Radware

Radware announced that "a leading global mobile telecommunications provider has purchased its Alteon® 10000 application delivery controllers (ADC) to help the carrier meet the explosive growth it has seen from customers using smartphones and mobile services, while at the same time consolidating its ADC platforms. The agreement is valued at over $1 million .. the operator needed a solution that would help it not only deliver greater throughput and on-demand scalability to manage unpredictable spikes in data traffic, but also consolidate its ADC units to reduce its data center footprint and lower the cost of ownership"

" .. it enabled the operator to adopt a virtualization program using a deployment model for creating a separate, isolated vADC for each application, enabling a virtual data center computing environment with flexible, independent and secured configurations that avoid over-provisioning. This allows the carrier to deploy new services faster than before and better align its ADC services that require frequent configuration changes"

See "Radware's Alteon 10000 Helps Global Mobile Carrier Reduce its Data Center Footprint and Manage Mobile Data Traffic" - here.

Google Fiber: Not to be Used with "Servers"

From the Google Fiber terms of service (here):

"Your Google Fiber account is for your use and the reasonable use of your guests. Unless you have a written agreement with Google Fiber permitting you do so, you should not host any type of server using your Google Fiber connection, use your Google Fiber account to provide a large number of people with Internet access, or use your Google Fiber account to provide commercial services to third parties (including, but not limited to, selling Internet access to third parties)".

From the FCC Net Neutrality rules (here):

".. fixed broadband providers may not block lawful content, applications, services, or non-harmful devices ..  fixed broadband providers may not unreasonably discriminate in transmitting lawful network traffic"

TM Deployments [101]: Smart [Philippines] Deployed GreenPacket for 3G/Wi-Fi Convergence and Targeted Advertisement

 
GreenPacket (see "GreenPacket Enhances Offloading with Policy Control" - here) announced that it has "secured a major win with Philippines’ largest wireless service provider, Smart Communications Inc .. Greenpacket’s award winning Intouch Connection Management Platform (ICMP) will enable Smart to be the first Philippines operator to offer converged connectivity across its 3G and WiFi access networks .. The ICMP solution enables seamless connectivity across 3G and WiFi access networks, thus providing a strategy for alleviate network congestion by offloading data to less expensive and less congested WiFi access networks. Additionally, the ICMP is customized to support Smart’s new targeted advertisement push services".

Smart Communications, a subsidiary of PLDT, is the Philippines' leading wireless services provider with 47.8 million subscribers on its GSM network as of end-June 2011 (see revenues chart for PLDT wireless services).

".. The company recently clinched a similar deal with Time Warner Cable .. The solution is also being deployed by Hong Kong’s leading telco, PCCW a 3G and 4G communications and technology provider .. [Kelvin Lee, Senior General Manager of Greenpacket] expects to close more deals for the ICMP suite of solutions with operators keen on finding avenues to optimize access networks, manage connectivity across devices and also generate more revenue"

See "Smart Communications Philippines Chooses Greenpacket’s Intouch Connectivity Management and Data Offload Solutions" - here.

Research: YouTube Flow-Control Causes Packet-Loss and Re-transmission

  
A research by Shane Alcock and Richard Nelson (picture) from the University of Waikato, Hamilton, New Zealand analyzes YouTube's application flow control.

See "Application Flow Control in YouTube Video Streams" - here.

ABSTRACT:  This paper presents the results of an investigation into the application flow control technique utilised by YouTube. We reveal and describe the basic properties of YouTube application flow control, which we term block sending, and show that it is widely used by YouTube servers. We also examine how the block sending algorithm interacts with the flow control provided by TCP and reveal that the block sending approach was responsible for over 40% of packet loss events in YouTube flows in a residential DSL dataset and the re-transmission of over 1% of all YouTube data sent after the application flow control began.

We conclude by suggesting that changing YouTube block sending to be less bursty would improve the performance and reduce the bandwidth usage of YouTube video streams.

The authors say that "We have presented these results to engineers at YouTube and their parent company, Google. They have acknowledged that this is a legitimate problem and are currently working on modifying the block sending algorithm to be less bursty. We believe that this will offer improved YouTube performance for users and reduce YouTube’s bandwidth requirements. The largest improvements will be seen by YouTube clients using congested connections, but well-connected clients should also see some benefit".

NSN: Policy based Traffic Management with Flexi NG + DPI

  

During MWC 2009 Nokia Siemens Networks announced its Evolved Packet Core (EPC) network solution for LTE - see "Nokia Siemens Networks brings LTE one step closer with EPC launch at Mobile World Congress 2009" - here, composed of two products -  Flexi Network Server and the Flexi Network Gateway (NG).

"The Flexi Network Gateway addresses the higher than ever demand for broadband connectivity, combined with the intelligence needed for flexible handling of data traffic according to policy rules of the operator's choice .. Building this new Evolved Packet Core on open ATCA technology allows Nokia Siemens Networks to tap into a hardware supply ecosystem and focus its own efforts on developing specific value added network functionality. Customers will benefit from a more coherent equipment practice across the market, which brings operational synergies."

Since then, the product was mentioned in several customer wins and trials, most recent one was MegaFon Russia - see "Russia tunes in to LTE" - here - but the web site does not have much on the product itself.

Nevertheless, in a presentation posted to NSN's Japanese site (here), we can find a slide (see below), describing how Flexi NG, with DPI support, may implement intelligent traffic management policies (more on NSN's PCRF product, PCS-5000, here).

Little help on translation (courtesy of Google Translate):

• Title - Value Innovation - Advanced Solution (Deep Packet Inspection)
• 2nd line -policy "triggers" - location, time, applications accessed, device type, network access type and volume balance
• In the network elements diagram - operation and charging elements
• The last line is the policy action list, including: QoS priority control, bandwidth allocation, service control, reporting, port re-direction (?), charging, optimization, filtering and security

 

DPI/QoS Announcements: Alcatel-Lucent Adds 100G Interface to the 7750 Service Router

  

Alcatel-Lucent announced today that the company has "launched its innovative 100G IPsolution in China, completing the first live demo of the Alcatel-Lucent 7750 Service Router’s (SR) 100 Gigabit Ethernet (100 GE) interface for China Telecom. The Alcatel-Lucent 7750 SR offers the industry’s first 100 GE solutions that support the broad array of edge services as well as full IP routing and Ethernet switching"

See "Alcatel-Lucent unveils industry-leading 100G IP technology in China" - here.

The 7750 Service router "Applications supported include Application Assurance, which leverages deep packet inspection (DPI) technology to provide application-level traffic reporting and traffic management capabilities, advanced video services (Fast Channel Change/Retransmission or Ad Insertion)".

See also - "[Update12 - Alcatel-Lucent 5780] PCRF - DPI Compatibility Matrix" - here about the use of the 7750 in mobile networks.

DPI/QoS Announcements: Meraki's Traffic Shaper

    

Although not targeting the broadband market, the new announcement from Meraki, a vendor of 801.11 access points, could be interesting as a solution to education and residential campuses which are very similar in needs and traffic patterns to commercial broadband services.

See "Meraki Debuts First Cloud-Based Application Traffic Shaper" - here.

The leading DPI vendors are also addressing this market (mainly education - see a recent Procera press release "Higher Education Keeps Moving to Procera Networks" - here). For campuses with 802.11 wireless access only, this may eliminate the need to add a DPI appliance - as Meraki's traffic shaping feature is embedded in Meraki's access point device "with no additional hardware or software, and at no additional cost. Traffic Shaper is currently in beta, and will be generally available September 30."

"Traffic Shaper enables administrators to: 

• Analyze network traffic by application or application class
• Enforce traffic shaping policies (e.g., limit each user’s peer to peer traffic)
• Stay up to date with hundreds of constantly updated application signatures
• Prioritize critical applications using QoS policies"

"Traffic Shaper" is also the name of a freeware product for Windows (here).

"Traffic Shaper operates through a custom-built layer 7 packet inspection engine running on each Meraki 802.11n access point. Meraki Traffic Shaper recognizes hundreds of applications, including recreational applications such as YouTube and BitTorrent, and business applications like Salesforce.com and Google Apps. Traffic Shaper provides extensive visibility and control into network usage. Administrators may view and control bandwidth consumption by application, by content type (e.g. video, audio, text), and by user. Meraki Traffic Shaper runs at line rate, with no loss of performance. "

Openet/Cisco Joint Policy/DPI Projects - Orange Group, Turkcell, Mobilkom Austria

 

The policy management market seems to flourish these days, and Cisco still does not have its own solution (see "Cisco Needs a Policy Server" - here).

Naturally, the pure players are trying to get closer to the giant and it seems that a number of them are getting some joint business - which makes its way to PR activity. After Bridgewater and Broadhop (see "Bridgewater and Broadhop are Getting Closer to Cisco" - here) we get now a new announcement from Openet.

See "Openet Announces Key Brazilian Policy Customer in Conjunction with the Cisco Developer Network (CDN) Program" - here.

The press release announces an anonymous "Brazilian Convergent Operator", but provides us with some insight into the relations between the two companies: "This customer win showcases continued momentum from Openet’s long-standing relationship with Cisco, spanning more than 10 years with successful customer engagements across the globe for Orange Group, Turkcell (here), Mobilkom Austria and a major USA wireless carrier, amongst others .. builds on its history of interoperability with a variety of Cisco products, including Cisco’s SCE [standalone DPI device], CSG, ASR5K [former Starent GGSN] and eGGSN packetcore solutions."

As for the new project - "The operator will be deploying Openet’s FusionWorks™ Policy Manager, a leading Policy and Charging Rules Function (PCRF) offering. When combined with the Cisco Deep Packet Inspection (DPI) solution ... This integrated solution will enable the operator to control its network resources using real-time applications of complex rules based on subscriber, service or usage context in a next-gen environment .. In addition to staying ahead of the competitive curve, the operator also plans to leverage Policy Manager for cost reduction. Specifically, OPEX expenses will fall by leveraging Openet’s policy capabilities to control traffic at an application level .."

See also a 2009 announcements - "Openet and Cisco Conclude OEM Deal for Integrated Policy Solution" - here and "Cisco and Openet Sign First Customer for OEM Policy Solution" - here.

Related posts:

• DPI Deployments (10): AT&T Uses Openet for iPad Monetization - here
• DPI Deployments (9): Orange France Selects Openet and Cisco for Parental Control and Tethering Prevention - here
• ATIS: "Policy Management is emerging as a key enabler to enhance the network with functionalities like DPI and QoS" - here
• PCRF - DPI Compatibility Matrix - here

AT&T to Apple: "Please Throttle iPhone Traffic"

 
Fred Vogelstein, from Wired Magazine, brings the story behind AT&T's effort to meet the demand from bandwidth generated by Apple's iPhone.

The story of AT&T and its efforts to answer the demand for mobile bandwidth, mainly in larger US cities, is not new. I covered this in a number of posts (here and here) and the common feeling was that AT&T will spend $B's (here) to increase its network capacity - as well as adding free WiFi services (here), moving away from unlimited service (here) and more. All these are local or longer term plans.

Now we hear that AT&T also tried to convince Apple to make changes to their applications, so bandwidth consumption will be reduced. Here's how Wired describes what AT&T tried to do. See "Bad Connection: Inside the iPhone Network Meltdown" - here:

".. In a bid to avert the looming problem, a team headed by senior vice president Kris Rinne met with Apple to ask for help. Of course AT&T was planning to upgrade its network to handle the increased demand, Rinne’s team told Apple executives, but that was going to take years. In the meantime, would Apple take measures to help throttle back the traffic? Perhaps Apple could restrict its YouTube app to run only over Wi-Fi. Maybe the iPhone could feature a smaller, lower-resolution videostream or cut off YouTube videos after one minute".

With traffic management solutions, AT&T could have done this (and more) without Apple's help (see the Belgacom example - here). They could also go for a tiered services concept like Telkomsel (here) and Elisa (here) - and maybe they are going there -see "AT&T Seeks Unified Policy Management for Wireline and Wireless" - here)

DPI/QoS Deployments (14): Telkomsel (Indonesia) Uses Ericsson for Service Differentiation and Traffic Control

  

Ericsson announced last week that Telkomsel is using its solution for "Dynamic End-to-End Policy Control solution enabling service differentiation"

See "New business models possible for mobile broadband" - here.

Telkomsel, a subsidiary of state owned PT TELKOM, the PSTN incumbent (65%) and SingTel Mobile (35%), is the biggest mobile operator in Indonesia, with 82M subscribers (end of Q1), of which 2M are post-paid subscribers. Telkomsel operates over 32,000 base stations
 "Telkomsel's efficient utilization of radio and transport networks will be enhanced through deployment of the policy control solution. .. Data traffic is prioritized so that higher-paying subscribers get access, high speed and quality even during network peak hours, while other users receive different priority".

More on Ericsson's policy product - here

Sarwoto Atmosutarno, President Director of Telkomsel, says: "As traffic is growing with more capacity-demanding services and higher download speeds, we must adjust to our users' different expectations and needs. With our new solution, subscribers will be able to choose a pricing option that best suits their individual needs, depending on what services or applications they're using and how much they're willing to pay."

Earlier this month we saw a similar announcement from NSN - see "Elisa (Finland) Uses NSN for Quality of Service Differentiation" - here.

BE (UK): World Cup Without Buffering

  

It seems that major sporting events are good for ISP marketing. After we saw Airtel's (India) "Cricket without Buffering" (here) we get now a new, a bit confusing I must say, campaign from BE (UK) to "end buffering, because it’s going to hinder you from making the most out of your online viewing experience".

This is announced in connection to the 2010 World Cup opened yesterday. See BE's blog post "BE’S CAMPAIGN TO BANISH BUFFERING" (here). The post mixes several issues related to Over the Top Video services: speed, throughput, traffic shaping and byte-cap (quota) trying to show that BE is has superior QoE compared to other ISPs.

So why it is sp confisuing?

For once, BE says that "For example, the average UK broadband speed is 3.6mbps, but streaming video needs an average of 9mbps of bandwidth to avoid buffering" - buffering is used to overcome the jitter (variance in throughput). You cannot stream 9 Mbps (if this is what you need) over 3.6 for 90 minutes football ("soccer") match ... (or buffering will take you almost 90 minutes). Buffering maybe needed with any connection speed, to overcome temporary congestion conditions anywhere between the subscriber and the streaming server.

BE's bottom line is "With no traffic shaping in place, you can be sure that you’ll never be “buffering about” ever again" (!). Actually, traffic shaping is the tool to grant higher (or highest) priority to streaming video .. traffic shaping is an effective toos to minimize buffering!

Related post - "Apple TV Goes Streaming, HD and to the Clouds" - here

BitTorrent: We will Take Charge of Throttling, Instead of ISPs (too Naive?)

  
The TorrentFreak site reports that "BitTorrent Inc. has open sourced uTP ... UTP promises less congestion for ISPs and end users without degrading overall download speeds .. With uTP, uTorrent has become more ‘network aware’ as it will throttle itself if congestion is detected in the network. The uTorrent team hopes this improvement will eliminate the need for ISPs to throttle BitTorrent traffic, while its users should see less interference with other local applications and possibly faster downloads".

See "BitTorrent Open Sources ‘Improved’ BitTorrent Protocol" - here, and BitTorrent's official blog "µTP Open Source Implementation" - here.

However, TorrentFreak remain skeptic and quotes BitTorrent's spokesperson Jenna Broughton: "We have not received any formal feedback from ISPs. Informally, several technical insiders have confirmed a noticeable shift in traffic from TCP to uTP, and they seem generally positive about the deployment thus far. Universally, they commend the spirit of cooperation in helping manage congestion on the network" 


I believe that ISPs need a "wide angle" monitoring of the network, and should have complex traffic management policies when they decide what, whom and to what extent throttle or prioritize certain applications. ISPs only do that with equipment that monitors their entire network traffic and is aware of their business goals and all network constrains.

Glasnost: These ISPs are Shaping Traffic!

   

During NSDI '10 (the 7th USENIX Symposium on Networked Systems Design and Implementation, held on April 28-30 in San Jose, CA), project "Glasnost" presented its methodology and findings regarding traffic shaping practices by ISP.

Glasnost is a research project done at the Max Plank Institute for Software Systems. Its goal is to "to make access networks, such as residential cable, DSL, and cellular broadband networks, more transparent to their customers." The research, led by Krishna P. Gummadi provides a list of ISPs that were detected to do shaping.

Here is an extract from the paper:

Note that the tests were conducted over a year ago. Since then, lots of DPI/Traffic shaping gear was sold and implemented - also by mobile (3G mainly) operators not covered in the above table.

An interesting finding is that operators tend to shape upstream traffic more than downstream. This maybe explained by a number of reasons, including:

• Upstream has lower capacity in most access technologies, and fills faster with P2P sharing uploads, also is also effecting downloads (as all TCP traffic is bi-directional)
   
• Uploading files serves "off-net" users and does not drive complaints or [expensive] calls to the help-desk

Also, it seems that most ISPs are shaping using DPI as they detect the application (layer 7) rather than the TCP port (layer 4). About half of the ISPs are shaping only during peak hours.

See "Glasnost: Enabling End Users to Detect Traffic Differentiation" - here (paper) and here (presentation)

New York Times: Vodafone, Telefonica, Swisscom, Kabel Deutschland Position on Traffic Management

 

NYT's  Kevin J. O'BRIEN covers the recent trends in traffic management vs. Net Neutrality debate - "Web’s Users Against Its Gatekeepers" - here.

Mr. O'Brien interviews of the European operators provide a direct testimony for their traffic management needs and/or actual deployments:

• Frederic Gastaldo, the head of strategy and innovation at Swisscom:  “..However, customers who do excessively use our data network are a big challenge for us" 

• Georg Merdian, director of the company’s infrastructure regulation Kabel Deutschland: “We anticipate we will soon have to use some kind of management techniques”

• Richard Feasey, public policy director, Vodafone  “We use a form of network management to say, ‘I’m sorry, you are not going to be able to get the same level of service unless you decide to top up'” 

• Robert Mourik, director of regulatory policy in Europe, Telefónica: “We have an explosion of traffic, but our revenues have not been growing at the same pace or staying flat ... What we are looking to do are commercial deals.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  

Alfa (Lebanon) Uses Openwave for Traffic Shaping

 

Openwave (NASDAQ:OPWV) reported quarterly results yesterday (here). Revenues were disappointing at $40.1M, compares to $49.7M in previous quarter and $44.7 on the same quarter last year. Shares dropped by 13.6% on Thursday, with nearly 8 times the average trading volume.

During the conference call (transcript  here) Openwave's CEO, Ken Denman, mentioned that "In the quarter we also signed a deal with Lebanese mobile operator, Alfa, which is upgraded to Integra to help them address bandwidth challenges head on by shaping their data traffic. With Integra installed Alfa can eventually monetize their mobile traffic ahead of the competition." .

Alfa (owned by the Orascom Telecom since February 2009) has over 1M subscribers. The site shows only GPRS/WAP technologies as available for their Mobile Internet service (here)

Openwave, that was focusing on mobile messaging has shifted in the recent quarters to a more comprehensive mobile data gateway solution. As mobile operators are seeking multi-function elements, mobile equipment vendors have to integrate more and more functions into their offering, as there will be no room for single-function standalone boxes. We can see this direction taken by many vendors, line Comverse (see "DPI – Recent Product Announcements, New Player" - here), Bytemobile and Flash Networks moving from optimization solutions to service gateways,  the merger between Mobixell and 724 Solutions (here).

DPI and traffic shaping is certainly one of these required integrated functions. For Openwave, this is somehow accomplished by the Media Optimizer, which includes a "Dynamic Bandwidth Shaping: Adjust the optimized media bit-rate delivered to the subscriber based on available network bandwidth".

While it does detect video traffic, the web site does not mention the detection of other important protocols (such as P2P file sharing) - so it seems that the DPI functionality is pretty basic. Openwave launched the Media Optimizer on February (press release - here), focusing on video traffic management.

DPI Deployments - Part8: Cricket - Quota with Traffic Management

  

Fierce Wireless reports on new Cricket/Leap Wireless (US Mobile operator) service plans - "Leap experimenting with new unlimited broadband plans" (here). 3 new plans will be offered, all with a monthly byte cap - 2.5, 5 or 10G.

However, once the cap is reached (in a rolling 30 days period), the data service does not stop or overcharged with ridicules rates - instead the effective download/upload data rate may go down ("penalty" in policy management terms).

Nice example of using subscriber-based policy management with QoS equipment. The solution comes from Sandvine and Openet - see a Sandvine press release issued earlier this year - "Sandvine Supports Cricket Broadband Internet " (here).

Cricket's definition for the "penalty" (here):

"Usage. This is the amount of data that you can upload and download in a rolling 30-day period before Cricket's Fair Use Policy may reduce your speed. Once the rolling 30-day data usage is below your rate plan Usage Level upload and download speeds will be restored. These Usage Levels affect only a small percentage of our customers and help ensure optimum performance for all Cricket customers."

Sky UK – Tiering without Traffic Shaping

 

Sky Broadband UK has announced 2 new broadband plans (see "Sky Launches New Up To 20Mb Broadband Product" - here) - "Sky Unlimited" and "Sky Everyday Lite". Both programs provide connection speeds of up to 20 Mbps (depending on the DSL link capabilities).

Sky Unlimited removes a 2 GB monthly cap that is imposed on the entry-level program, Sky Everyday Lite, for extra £7.5/month.

This is a very simple tiering plan, as the Lite program addresses subscribers who are accessing the net for occasional web browsing and some email only. Anyone else, has to go to the Unlimited plan. Sky is bundling this with their TV services.

Subscribers of both program are NOT subject for traffic shaping, although Sky's third program (used for wholesale), "Sky Broadband Connect:" is (see "DPI Deployments - Part4: UK - Everybody is Doing it !" - here - and Sky's policy "Traffic management of our Network" - here).

DPI Announcements - Acision Broadband Mobility Suite

Next week's CTIA show brings some announcements - this time let's look at what Acision will be demoing.

Like many other vendors in related spaces, Acision is also addressing the traffic management aspect of mobile internet or as they say "enabling operators to gain control over their network utilization, while simultaneously increasing mobile broadband revenue and profit per gigabyte " (press release - here). All trendy keywords are there - "policy management and enforcement, web and media optimization, service allowance and bundle management, charging, location-awareness and VAS "

Some of the announced features, such as the following, require the use of DPI. I don’t see more detailed product information at the site nor list of technology partners providing these features, though.

• "Bundles where two devices, such as a laptop and a mobile phone share the same package" - this is a requirement from many mobile operators, trying to prevent customers abusing the service terms
   
• "Packages that exclude data-intensive applications that put high pressure on the network, like P2P downloading" - Requires DPI to identify, accurately, P2P.  

See an interview with Acision's Steven van Zanen, VP of Product Marketing, made last month at MWC.

DPI Deployments - Part4: UK - Everybody is Doing it !

     

On June 2008, the UK regulator Ofcom published its Voluntary Code of Practice: Broadband Speeds "a voluntary and self-regulatory measure" (here). The code suggests that ISPs will disclose to their subscribers (and the public) the real service levels they provide.

In particular interest to our discussion is section 39: "Where ISPs apply traffic management and shaping policies, they should publish on their website, in a clear and easily accessible form, information on the restrictions applied. This should include the types of applications, services and protocols that are affected and specific information on peak traffic periods"

Ofcom maintains a list of ISPs that endorsed the code (here). The list has over 50 names, including all leading UK ISPs.

These ISPs should according to section 33 - "use their best endeavours to set out clearly, and in a prominent place on their websites (e.g. within help or FAQs sections), information relating to their respective policies on fair usage; traffic management and traffic shaping to cover, at a minimum, the matters set out below."


In my earlier post - "Net-Neutrality Crosses the Pond" (here) I brought the relevant policies of the UK leading ISPs - Plusnet, TalkTalk, Virgin Media and Sky - having in total over 15M subscribers. Plusnet even issued a press release "PlusNet welcome Ofcom's Broadband Speed Code of Practice" (here) saying that "Although the code of practice is certainly a step in the right direction, we would question whether these voluntary guidelines go far enough"

As we can see, the majority of the internet traffic in the UK is subject to traffic control. Some of the ISPs' stated policies could not be achieved without DPI (needed, for example, to detect "downloads") - and there even some public announcements on that:

• Plusnet (BT retail service) is using Ellacoya (now Arbor Networks) - see PlusNet Picks Ellacoya (here). This was one the first DPI deployments by a larger ISP, world-wide.
   
• Carphone (TalkTalk) is using Sandvine - "Carphone Warehouse Selects Sandvine to Enhance Subscriber Internet Experience" (here) - one of the earlier adapters of Sandvine's 10Gbps DPI product. Carphone consumer retail service is TalkTalk (listed above).

While using DPI for traffic management, fair-use or congestion management seems to be well accepted in the UK, the imitative of several ISPs to use DPI for targeted advertizing (using a solution from the UK based Phorm) failed with severe consequences:

UK ISP BT Could Face CPS Prosecution over Secret Phorm Trials  - "The Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) has confirmed that it is still assessing the prospect of opening a criminal case against BT following the operator’s secret trials of Phorm in 2006/2007. Phorm controversially worked with UK broadband ISPs ( BT , TalkTalk and Virgin Media ) to develop a system that would monitor what websites you viewed for use in targeted advertising campaigns, though many likened its service to Spyware." (here)

Showing us the good and bad in DPI - and maybe it is better to disclose your service details rather being "secret".