SAN FRANCISCO : Google has begun offering tools to expose
Internet service providers (ISPs) that choke traffic or shift users
into slow lanes while allowing others to zip along at high
speeds.
The online search and advertising king is an unabashed champion of
"net neutrality" in which all Internet traffic is treated equally
instead of letting service providers give preferential treatment to
privileged clients.
"At Google, we care deeply about sustaining the Internet as an open
platform for consumer choice and innovation," Google chief
evangelist Vint Cerf and principal engineer Stephen Stuart wrote in
an online posting.
"No matter your views on net neutrality and ISP network management
practices, everyone can agree that Internet users deserve to be
well-informed about what they're getting when they sign up for
broadband."
Google worked with New America Foundation's Open Technology
Institute, the PlanetLab Consortium, and academic researchers to
create an online Measurement Lab (M-Lab) that researchers can use
to detect Internet traffic manipulation.
"When an Internet application doesn't work as expected or your
connection seems flaky, how can you tell whether there is a problem
caused by your broadband ISP, the application, your PC, or
something else?" Cerf wrote.
"It can be difficult for experts, let alone average Internet users,
to address this sort of question today."
M-Lab went online Wednesday with three diagnostic tools running on
computer servers near Google headquarters in Mountain View,
California.
The tools are available to help users "diagnose common problems
that might impair their broadband speed, as well as determine
whether BitTorrent is being blocked or throttled by their ISPs,"
according to Cerf, a computer scientist often called "father of the
Internet."
ISPs such as US behemoth Comcast have sparked controversy by
clandestinely throttling some traffic, such as peer-to-peer file
sharing.
ISPs argue that such measures are necessary to manage growing
congestion on the Internet highway. Google has been among those
advocating against fettering online traffic, saying that doing so
stifles Internet innovation and growth.
M-Lab is in a nascent phase and through the year Google will add
servers in a dozen locations in Europe and the United States. More
diagnostic tools will be added and results made public, according
to Google.
"M-Lab is intended to be a truly community-based effort, and we
welcome the support of other companies, institutions, researchers,
and users that want to provide servers, tools, or other resources
that can help the platform flourish," Cerf wrote.
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