December 2013
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Greetings! Enjoy another issue of NetEqualizer News! This month, we discuss new features planned for 2014, announce our FlyAway Contest winner, give you a heads-up on some options for your old NE2000 devices, and highlight NetGladiator enhancements. As always, feel free to pass this along to others who might be interested in NetEqualizer News. |
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A message from Art…
Art Reisman, CTO – APconnections
As the year comes to a close, we are wrapping up our 2013 goals and now starting to look ahead to 2014! I am excited about We love it when we hear back from you – so if you have a story you would like to share with us of how we have helped you, let us know. Email me directly at art@apconnections.net. I would love to hear from you! |
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The New Year is the perfect time to start thinking about new features for NetEqualizer! It is also a great time for you to start thinking about upgrading your device to the latest software. 2013 saw a lot of changes for NetEqualizer and for 2014 we plan on building on that base even more. In 2014, keep an eye out for some of these exciting new ideas: 1) Expanded caching – We’ve been enhancing our NetEqualizer Caching Option (NCO) for the the last several months and you should expect even more from this add-on feature in 2014. We are testing out larger SSD drives, assessing whether Netflix can be cached, and looking for even more caching opportunities. 2) Heuristic-based identification – This is a really cool concept that we are currently developing. It is based on the idea that each user has their own unique “path” once they join the network. Knowing that path can help to identify users. The principles apply to both bandwidth optimization and security. Over the next year we’ll be implementing this idea and seeing what value it could add to both our NetEqualizer and NetGladiator product lines. See the next article, NetGladiator Continues to Grow, for more information. 3) Bigger, better, faster Reporting (RTR) – We have received very positive feedback on our initial RTR rollout, and our enhanced RTR Traffic Reports, which are currently in Beta. We now feel it is time to expand RTR, with a goal to completely replace our ntop historical reporting by end of 2014. We spent a lot of time in 2013 improving our user interface, and our commitment to making NetEqualizer easy to use will show in 2014 as well. Expect new features in our Dynamic Real-Time Reporting tool including, but not limited to: These features will be free to customers with valid NetEqualizer Software and Support who are running version 7.0+ (NCO features will require NCO). If you are not current with NSS, contact us today! -or- 303-997-1300 NetGladiator Continues to Grow Our investment in IPS continues! Also, we have talked to some of you in 2013 regarding your IPS needs. If you are looking for a simple, elegant, and affordable way to protect your web applications, you should think about the NetGladiator. You should also consider taking our Hacking Challenge to see if your web applications are safe and secure! -or- 303-997-1300 to discuss your security needs. Our CTO, Art Reisman, will be speaking at another local linux user group in early January. The Boulder Linux Users Group will host the event in downtown Boulder, CO on January 9, 2014 at 6pm. Boulder is one of the biggest technology hotbeds outside of Silicon Valley, and we think there will be a lot of interesting discussion and ideas that come out of this meeting. If you are in the Boulder, CO area at the time, feel free to stop on by! And the FlyAway Contest Winner is… Every few months, we have a drawing to give away two round-trip domestic airline tickets from Frontier Airlines to one lucky person who’s recently tried out our online NetEqualizer demo. The time has come to announce this round’s winner. And the winner is… Jeff Gay at Morrisville State College! Congratulations, Jeff! Please contact us within 30 days (by January 17, 2014) at: -or- 303-997-1300 to claim your prize! Earlier this year, we announced that we are discontinuing our NE2000 series, and are moving the NE2000 license levels (20, 50, 100, and 150Mbps) onto the NE3000 platform. This change was made to get ready for our 7.0+ 64-bit releases, and also to take advantage of multi-core processing. We also felt that it was time to consolidate on the NE3000 platform. We have talked to many of you regarding this change. However, if you have not already talked to us about trading in your NE2000, we offer a generous 50% trade-in credit of your original unit purchase price towards a new unit (1 trade-in credit per unit purchased please).NE2000 options differ depending on when your NE2000 was purchased. Some of the more recent NE2000’s (purchases from August 2011 and later) can run our 7.0+ software, and these customers will be able to get support AFTER 12/31/2014 on these units. For units purchased prior to August 20011 that cannot run 7.0+, support will be offered through 12/13/2014. Contact us at: -or- 303-997-1300 to discuss your options. Latest Notes on the Peer to Peer Front and DMCA Notices
By Art Reisman – CTO – APconnections Just getting back from our tech talk seminar today at Western Michigan University. The topic of DMCA requests came up in our discussions, and here are some of my notes on the subject. Background: The DMCA, which is the enforcement arm of the motion picture copyright conglomerate, tracks down users with illegal content. They seem to sometimes shoot first and ask questions later when sending out their notices more specific detail to follow. Unconfirmed Rumor has it, that one very large University in the State of Michigan just tosses the requests in the garbage and does nothing with them, I have heard of other organizations taking this tact. They basically claim this problem for the DMCA is not the responsibility of the ISP. I also am aware of a sovereign Caribbean country that also ignores them. I am not advocating this as a solution just an observation…
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Photo Of The Month
 Happy Holidays!
Our CTO, Art Reisman, entered this truck in the Louisville, CO Holiday Parade. It was about 5 degrees below zero (Fahrenheit) when it was in the parade. This is the 2nd year that Art has created a “Christmas Truck,” and he uses it to deliver cookies to neighbors as well during the Holiday Season.
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Every few months, we have a drawing to give away two roundtrip domestic airline tickets from
NetEqualizer News Blog 
Behind the Scenes on the latest Comcast Ruling on Net Neutrality
April 7, 2010 — netequalizerYesterday the FCC ruled in favor of Comcast regarding their rights to manipulate consumer traffic . As usual, the news coverage was a bit oversimplified and generic. Below we present a breakdown of the players involved, and our educated opinion as to their motivations.
1) The Large Service Providers for Internet Service: Comcast, Time Warner, Quest
From the perspective of Large Service Providers, these companies all want to get a return on their investment, charging the most money the market will tolerate. They will also try to increase market share by consolidating provider choices in local markets. Since they are directly visible to the public, they will also be trying to serve the public’s interest at heart; for without popular support, they will get regulated into oblivion. Case in point, the original Comcast problems stemmed from angry consumers after learning their p2p downloads were being redirected and/or blocked.
Any and all government regulation will be opposed at every turn, as it is generally not good for private business. In the face of a strong headwind, don’t be surprised if Large Service Providers might try to reach a compromise quickly to alleviate any uncertainty. Uncertainty can be more costly than regulation.
To be fair, Large Service Providers are staffed top to bottom with honest, hard-working people but, their decision-making as an entity will ultimately be based on profit. To be the most profitable they will want to prevent third-party Traditional Content Providers from flooding their networks with videos. That was the original reason why Comcast thwarted bittorrent traffic. All of the Large Service Providers are currently, or plotting to be, content providers, and hence they have two motives to restrict unwanted traffic. Motive one, is to keep their capacities in line with their capabilities for all generic traffic. Motive two, would be to thwart other content providers, thus making their content more attractive. For example who’s movie service are you going to subscribe with? A generic cloud provider such as Netflix whose movies run choppy or your local provider with better quality by design?
2) The Traditional Content Providers: Google, YouTube, Netflix etc.
They have a vested interest in expanding their reach by providing expanded video content. Google, with nowhere to go for new revenue in the search engine and advertising business, will be attempting an end-run around Large Service Providers to take market share. The only thing standing in their way is the shortcomings in the delivery mechanism. They have even gone so far as to build out an extensive, heavily subsidized, fiber test network of their own. Much of the hubbub about Net Neutrality is based on a market play to force Large Service Providers to shoulder the Traditional Content Providers’ delivery costs. An analogy from the bird world would be the brown-headed cowbird, where the mother lays her eggs in another bird’s nest, and then lets her chicks be raised by an unknowing other species. Without their own delivery mechanism direct-to-the-consumer, the Traditional Content Providers must keep pounding at the FCC for rulings in their favor. Part of the strategy is to rile consumers against the Large Service Providers, with the Net Neutrality cry.
3) The FCC
The FCC is a government organization trying to take their existing powers, which were granted for airwaves, and extend them to the Internet. As with any regulatory body, things start out well-intentioned, protection of consumers etc., but then quickly they become self-absorbed with their mission. The original reason for the FCC was that the public airways for television and radio have limited frequencies for broadcasts. You can’t make a bigger pipe than what frequencies will allow, and hence it made sense to have a regulatory body oversee this vital resource. In the early stages of commercial radio, there was a real issue of competing entities broadcasting over each other in an arms race for the most powerful signal. Along those lines, the regulatory entity (FCC) has forever expanded their mission. For example, the government deciding what words can be uttered on primetime is an extension of this power.
Now with Internet, the FCC’s goal will be to regulate whatever they can, slowly creating rules for the “good of the people”. Will these rules be for the better? Most likely the net effect is no; left alone the Internet was fine, but agencies will be agencies.
4) The Administration and current Congress
The current Administration has touted their support of Net Neutrality, and perhaps have been so overburdened with the battle on health care and other pressing matters that there has not been any regulation passed. In the face of the aftermath of the FCC getting slapped down in court to limit their current powers, I would not be surprised to see a round of legislation on this issue to regulate Large Service Providers in the near future. The Administraton will be painted as consumer protection against big greedy companies that need to be reigned in, as we have seen with banks, insurance companies, etc…. I hope that we do not end up with an Internet Czar, but some regulation is inevitable, if nothing else for a revenue stream to tap into.
5) The Public
The Public will be the dupes in all of this, ignorant voting blocks lobbied by various scare tactics. The big demographic difference on swaying this opinion will be much different from the health care lobby. People concerned for and against Internet Regulation will be in income brackets that have a higher education and employment rate than the typical entitlement lobbies that support regulation. It is certainly not going to be the AARP or a Union Lobbyist leading the charge to regulate the Internet; hence legislation may be a bit delayed.
6) Al Gore
Not sure if he has a dog in this fight; we just threw him in here for fun.
7) NetEqualizer
Honestly, bandwidth control will always be needed, as long as there is more demand for bandwidth than there is bandwidth available. We will not be lobbying for or against Net Neutrality.
8) The Courts
This is an area where I am a bit weak in understanding how a Court will follow legal precedent. However, it seems to me that almost any court can rule from the bench, by finding the precedent they want and ignoring others if they so choose? Ultimately, Congress can pass new laws to regulate just about anything with impunity. There is no constitutional protection regarding Internet access. Most likely the FCC will be the agency carrying out enforcement once the laws are in place.
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