Major Internet providers slowing traffic speeds for thousands across US

Major Internet providers, including AT&T, Time Warner and Verizon, are slowing data from popular websites to thousands of US businesses and residential customers in dozens of cities across the country, according to a study released June 22. The study, conducted by Internet activists BattlefortheNet, looked at the results from 300,000 internet users and found significant degradations on the networks of the five largest internet service providers (ISPs), representing 75 percent of all wireline households across the US.

The study, supported by the technologists at Open Technology Institute’s M-Lab, examines the comparative speeds of Content Delivery Networks (CDNs), which shoulder some of the data load for popular websites. Any site that becomes popular enough has to pay a CDN to carry its content on a network of servers around the country (or the world) so that the material is close to the people who want to access it. Tim Karr of Free Press, one of the groups that makes up BattlefortheNet, said the finding show ISPs are not providing content to users at the speeds they’re paying for. “For too long, Internet access providers and their lobbyists have characterized net neutrality protections as a solution in search of a problem,” said Karr. “Data compiled using the Internet Health Test show us otherwise -- that there is widespread and systemic abuse across the network. The irony is that this trove of evidence is becoming public just as many in Congress are trying to strip away the open internet protections that would prevent such bad behavior.”