Cox To Test Bandwidth-Throttling System

Cox Communications next month will begin testing a bandwidth-management system that the cable operator said may "momentarily" delay non-time-sensitive Internet applications, such as peer-to-peer file swapping, and the plan has already drawn fire from Free Press. The proposed Cox system explicitly discriminates based on type of application. For example, the cable operator said, streaming video downloads -- which are sensitive to network delays -- would take priority over a P2P download during times of congestion. In a statement issued Tuesday night, Ben Scott, policy director of consumer-rights lobbying group Free Press, said the group was "concerned about any cable or phone company picking winners and losers online." "The lesson we learned from the Comcast case is that we must be skeptical of any practice that comes between users and the Internet," Scott said. "These kinds of practices cut against the fundamental neutrality of the open Internet. We urge the FCC to subject this practice to close scrutiny and call on Cox to provide its customers with more technical details about exactly what it's doing." Free Press also noted that a study by German researchers last May indicated that Cox was engaging in peer-to-peer throttling similar to Comcast.