What Cogent Traffic Management Revelations Mean for Net Neutrality Proposal

[Commentary] Cogent’s peering disputes with several consumer broadband providers caused performance to degrade not only for those providers but also for some other network operators. Cogent had to drop packets because of congestion on its connections to certain consumer broadband providers, Cogent dropped wholesale customers’ packets before those of retail customers because retail customers tend to use applications such as VoIP that are most sensitive to delay.

Cogent critics say that move amounts to creating a slow lane and a fast lane, suggesting that it is the exact sort of traffic prioritization that network neutrality advocates want to outlaw. Cogent denies it created slow and fast lanes, saying that any dropped packets were promptly re-sent -- although some might argue against any type of packet prioritization.