My brother's ISP sent him this email...

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silasbear

Limp Gawd
Joined
Jul 14, 2005
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451
-----Original Message-----
From: [email protected] [mailto:[email protected]]
Sent: Tuesday, March 27, 2007 3:20 PM
To: [email protected]
Subject: Notice of Sustained High Bandwidth Usage



Dear Insight Broadband Customer,

Insight monitors network usage to ensure that all Insightbb.com customers consistently receive the highest quality service available, as detailed in our Acceptable Use Policy.

You may not be aware that your modem has been transferring data at a very high rate for an extended period, causing degradation of service to others. Now that you know, we request your cooperation.

Excessive sustained bandwidth usage places a burden on the network and is in violation of the Insightbb.com Acceptable Use Policy (see sections vii and viii. ) which explains that you may not:

vii. restrict, inhibit or otherwise interfere with the ability of any other person, regardless of intent, purpose or knowledge, to use or enjoy the Service, including, without limitation, posting or transmitting any information or software which contains a worm, virus or other harmful feature, or generating levels of traffic sufficient to impede others' ability to send or retrieve information;

viii. restrict, inhibit, interfere with or otherwise disrupt or cause a performance degradation or manipulation, regardless of intent, purpose or knowledge, to the Service or any Insight (or Insight supplier) host, server, backbone network, node or service, or otherwise cause a performance degradation or manipulation to any Insight (or Insight supplier) facilities used to deliver the Service.

We have found most excessive bandwidth users are running servers, using Newsgroups or using online file sharing programs such as KaZaa, BitTorrent and others.

We feel it our responsibility to alert you to the dangers of online file sharing applications and offer suggestions as to what can be done to protect yourself as well as reduce the amount of bandwidth being used by your account. For instance:

* There are a number of viruses designed specifically to spread through peer-to-peer networks. Your best defense is to keep your anti-virus software updated. If a file you download seems smaller in size than expected, you should avoid running it. Many of the viruses that exist at the moment will rename themselves to mimic popular programs, music, or videos in hopes that the victim will open it.
* Most of the file sharing applications contain "spyware" that is used by affiliates and marketing companies. Besides being an invasion of your privacy, many End User License Agreements (EULAs) grant these companies the power to use your extra bandwidth, processor cycles, memory, and drive space as they see fit.
* Copyright infringement caused by sharing copyrighted material.

For more details on the dangers of online file sharing:

http://help.insightbb.com/security/onlinesharing_dangers.aspx

For help in disabling file sharing software:

http://help.insightbb.com/security/disable_onlinesharing.aspx

For questions concerning this email:

800-715-1774 (leave name, phone number, and best time/date for us to call)

Thank You,

Insight Broadband
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He was uploading a top gear video @ 150KBps and the ISP sent him this notice.

I have never heard of this until now. Isn't this their fault for not capping the upload speeds on their end.

Does this mean he can't fully utilize the DL/UL speed that he is paying for?

He mentioned that they are working on getting better equipment to alleviate this issue, but does he have to compensate for their lack of adequate bandwidth?:confused:
 
well,
if i got the letter, i would be on the phone in 2.2 seconds, and ready to express my extreme displeasure at getting a notice.
but that's me.

You can look at it two ways...
1. They noticed this excess (whatever) traffic and didn't know if it could be something malicious and thought they would send out a letter in case someone was running a spambot without knowing it. For the average person, a decent service to offer, even if it is completely self serving.

or...

2. They need keep thier nose out of your stuff, if they don't want you uploading at 150K then they should cap uploads like just about every other cable company on earth. If they are going to be sending shit like that out, they need to provide you with an official policy of what thier limits are, in writing ASAP. If they are going to advertise a speed, then they better god damn expect someone to use that speed.

If you want to try to get a free months service or something for the hassle (you had to copy and paste it in this forum) of this notice, read on...

My advice would be to start of nice and act like you aren't sure what they are talking about, and then start laying in on them. Have your talking points written down ahead of time, get names, id numbers, and direct extensions if possible, don't let the person transfer you, tell them it's thier problem and you want to talk through them, and expect to talk to a couple managers, if not directly, then through the person who 'owns' your problem. Keep cool though, once you seem irrational, they can disconnect you and they win, because then your just an asshole.

If anyone is rude to you about this, write a letter to the company, send it to the CEO and the customer service rep. Quote names, dates, employee numbers and express your frustration with the situation.

Good luck
 
Unfortunately, it is rare that you're actually allowed to use the upload you pay for. I uploaded a couple hundred megs (400 max) of high res wedding photos on one of my past connections and was accused of all sorts of things by the "security department" whom i was required to speak to to get uncapped (they capped me to 128kbit, from 10mbit)

Then they made me promise i wouldnt do it again. They wouldnt turn me back on until I promised that I wouldnt do something there was absolutely nothing wrong with.
 
Unfortunately, this is a common problem. You may get results with the above recommended actions, or you may not. The fact of it is this: He signed up for their service. Not that anybody ever does, but he did so having had an opportunity to read their TOS. Their TOS likely says they can shut him off on a whim. So if he has a problem with it, he should find another vendor to work with that has TOS he likes.

Not the answer that will make anybody happy, but an answer none the less.
 
Take a look at the last bullet:

* Copyright infringement caused by sharing copyrighted material.

You didn't explain the full details, but you openly admitted that he was uploading Top Gear. As much as I love Top Gear, it is copyrighted by BBC. Your brother might just have just been uploading Top gear when an admin decided to look at some logs...
 
i doubt that is the only file he has uploaded in the past 30 days that would have caused this to happen. Call the ISP and they should be able to provide you with the amount of bandwidth he was using up and down. if it exceeeds what you feel was reasonable for the info you where transfering you may have a virus using your bandwidth.


if their numbers match yours then you should read the TOS better as all ISP's have a bandwidth usage policy.
 
versello said:
Take a look at the last bullet:

* Copyright infringement caused by sharing copyrighted material.

You didn't explain the full details, but you openly admitted that he was uploading Top Gear. As much as I love Top Gear, it is copyrighted by BBC. Your brother might just have just been uploading Top gear when an admin decided to look at some logs...
Click to expand...


Your ISP does not look nor does it care what you upload. it is up to the copyright holder to look for their copyrighted material and unless your ISP is the BBC then i think your safe from that. Their mention of file sharing is a obvious guess at an explination to the issue as most intenret users dont use a lot of upload except for P2P and any one running some sort of file server or HTTP and in most cases someone who is infected with a virus or trojan.
 
silasbear said:
He was uploading a top gear video @ 150KBps and the ISP sent him this notice.

I have never heard of this until now. Isn't this their fault for not capping the upload speeds on their end.:
Click to expand...

ISPs are clamping down on P2P/warez users...which are a HUUUUUUUUGE burden on the ISPs resources. They are concerned with web performance, and e-mail performance, for the majority of their clients.

My hunch is this is not the first P2P upload your brother has done..in order to get a letter from them...your brother has been on their radar for some time now.

Your TOS...acceptable use of the ISPs resources, you are not guaranteed 100% of your "up to" bandwidth 24x7 to do with what you please. Home user accounts are not the same as business grade accounts. It's been that way even back in the dial up days.
 
YeOldeStonecat said:
Home user accounts are not the same as business grade accounts. It's been that way even back in the dial up days.
Click to expand...

Which is why I have a business account at home. Gotta love static IPs. But it counts as a business expense for me, so I get to write it off.
 
MorfiusX said:
Which is why I have a business account at home. Gotta love static IPs. But it counts as a business expense for me, so I get to write it off.
Click to expand...

how much and what speed?

i have cox personal account right now
 
Most ISP's have some limitation on how much you can consume of the bandwidth, and eventually you'll get noticed if you horde too much. Bandwidth does cost them money too, the reason you can get such high speeds at such a low cost is that everyone shares the real cost of service and the typical user never comes close to exceeding any limits they impose, but those who do get noticed real quick.
 
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