BROOKE GLADSTONE:
On the Internet, the saying goes, no one knows you're a dog -- or a giant Internet service provider masquerading as an ordinary user. And apparently that's what the ISP Comcast is doing. When file sharers use services like BitTorrent to try and load a file from a Comcast user, an MP3, say, or a movie, Comcast sends coded messages to both computers telling them to stop the transfer. It's like a telephone operator breaking into a conversation, telling each person in the voice of the other, sorry, I have to hang up, goodbye.

So writes Associated Press reporter Peter Svensson, who conducted a test to confirm Comcast's use of the tactic. And it illustrates the power of ISPs to control the activity of their users. In fact, they always had the power but they're rarely caught actually using it.

It goes to the core of the argument over network neutrality. Advocacy groups, not to mention giant web-based companies like Google, eBay and Amazon, want legislation to ensure that broadband providers treat all data equally. Otherwise, they say, ISPs could make websites pay huge sums to ensure their pages load quickly, thus giving rich companies an advantage over small and sometimes more innovative start-ups.

The AP's Peter Svensson exposed Comcast's undercover interference when he used a file-sharing service to try and download an electronic version of the Bible.
PETER SVENSSON:
When I, here in New York on a non-Comcast connection, tried to download a copy of the Bible from Comcast subscribers in other areas of the country that transfer was blocked, and we traced the interference to messages apparently inserted by Comcast. And these messages had forged return addresses, the addresses of the two computers at either end of the connection.
BROOKE GLADSTONE:
A lot of people are using these peer-to-peer networks to illegally download copywritten material. But legal content is also being distributed by these services.
PETER SVENSSON:
That's right. We used a non-copyrighted file, obviously. It was also actually quite a small file, and that transfer was, in fact, blocked, or, as Comcast would say, it was delayed.
BROOKE GLADSTONE:
Now [LAUGHS], let's talk about that distinction, because it's an important one. A delay is not a block. What do we have here?
PETER SVENSSON:
This is really, gets into semantics here. Comcast is saying eventually they will let those connections through. And I saw that in one case where we kept trying to retrieve the Bible. And after ten minutes, it did, in fact, connect and transfer. Ten minutes [LAUGHS] is a very long time in Internet terms [BROOKE LAUGHS] and I think Comcast is hoping that the person who's trying to download from a Comcast subscriber is going to conclude that, okay, I'm not getting it from there, I'm going to download it from some other ISP. So they're sort of shifting the traffic away from themselves.
BROOKE GLADSTONE:
So how did Comcast justify its actions?
PETER SVENSSON:
They're saying that they need to manage the network to keep it running smoothly for all its users. The reason they're deciding to stifle file-sharing traffic first is that it's traffic that’s continuous. People will leave their applications going for days and maybe even weeks on end, continuously sending upstream traffic. And that's a big headache. And the ISPs say a relatively small number of their subscribers are heavy users of this file-sharing traffic.
BROOKE GLADSTONE:
So they're road-hogs.
PETER SVENSSON:
Yes, road-hogs or bandwidth-hogs.
BROOKE GLADSTONE:
But this action of Comcast to herd the hogs over to one side of the road, it doesn't just affect Comcast users, right?
PETER SVENSSON:
No. In fact, Comcast users may be the ones who notice it the least. Comcast is not blocking downloads of, for instance, files on BitTorrent. If they were doing that, it would be immediately noticeable to their subscribers and they'd be inundated with calls. Instead, they're blocking some uploads. Really, the people who are the most affected here are people on other ISPs who are trying to download from Comcast subscribers. And if it so happens that a certain file you want is only on the computers of Comcast subscribers, you may be unable to get that file.

And certainly if more ISPs started doing the same thing Comcast is doing, we could pretty much say goodbye to file sharing. It's difficult to see how file sharing could survive.
BROOKE GLADSTONE:
But wouldn't it also be difficult to see how broadband [LAUGHS] service would survive if the ability to send and receive these large files was so circumscribed?
PETER SVENSSON:
Yeah. I think we're moving away from the early phase of the Internet, which was very much about email and Web surfing, and, unfortunately, some ISPs are poorly set up to make this transition from an Internet that's less about us pulling down content from the big content providers and more about being creative and being sharers.
BROOKE GLADSTONE:
Peter, thank you very much.
PETER SVENSSON:
Thank you.
BROOKE GLADSTONE:
Associated Press reporter, Peter Svensson.