Detecting network neutrality violations with causal inference

We present NANO, a system that detects when ISPs apply policies that discriminate against specific classes of applications, users, or destinations. Existing systems for detecting discrimination are typically specific to an application or to a particular discrimination mechanism and rely on active measurement tests. Unfortunately, ISPs can change discrimination policies and mechanisms, and they can evade these tests by giving probe traffic higher priority. NANO detects ISP discrimination by passively collecting performance data from clients. To distinguish discrimination from other causes of degradation (e.g., overload, misconfiguration, failure), NANO establishes a causal relationship between an ISP and observed performance by adjusting for confounding factors. NANO agents deployed at participating clients across the Internet collect performance data for selected services and report this information to centralized servers, which analyze the measurements to establish causal relationshi...

• Type: Conference
• Year: 2009
• Where: CONEXT
• Authors: Muhammad Mukarram Bin Tariq, Murtaza Motiwala, Nick Feamster, Mostafa H. Ammar
• Keywords: Computer Networks, CONEXT 2009, Discrimination Policies, ISPs Apply Policies, Particular Discrimination Mechanism