[Infowarrior] - Comcast using new disruptive traffic-shaping

[Richard Forno]

 New traffic shaping can disrupt a Comcast Internet connection

Recently, it has been observed that Comcast is disrupting TCP connections
using forged TCP reset (RST) packets [1]. These reset packets were
originally targeted at TCP connections associated with the BitTorrent
file-sharing protocol. However, Comcast has stated that they are
transitioning to a more "protocol neutral" traffic shaping approach [2]. We
have recently observed this shift in policy, and have collected network
traffic traces to demonstrate the behavior of their traffic shaping. In
particular, we are able (during peak usage times) to synthetically generate
a relatively large number of TCP reset packets aimed at any new TCP
connection regardless of the application-level protocol. Surprisingly, this
traffic shaping even disrupts normal web browsing and e-mail applications.
Specifically, we observe two different types of packet forgery and packets
being discarded. 

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