Comcast Corp. (NASDAQ: CMCSA), the second-largest high-speed Internet provider behind AT&T Inc. (NYSE:T) is denying accusations made by bloggers that it's restricting users' access to the popular video-sharing service BitTorrent.
The bloggers, though, say they aren't buying Comcast's denials and their concerns have been heard on top Tech Web sites including Cnet.com, Slashdot.org and The Register, creating a public relations headache for the Philadelphia-based company. More than 240 people have commented about the issue on the news-sharing site Digg.com, most of them critical of Comcast. Some articles have gotten thousands of Diggs, or recommenations.
Charlie Douglas, a Comcast spokesman, told us: "We're not blocking access to any applications, including BitTorrent. We don't look at specific customer activity on the Internet or track what Web sites people go to."
Christopher Yoo, a professor at the University of Pennsylvania Law School, gave credence to Comcast's denial by saying the company probably has no incentive to thwart users of BitTorrent and noted that the BitTorrent problems aren't happening to all Comcast users. "Comcast has every incentive to make its network as attractive as possible to users while at the same time keeping up with the bandwidth," he said.
But John Palfrey, head of the Berkman Center for Internet and Society at Harvard Law School, gave us a different take. "ISPs have a bunch of reasons not to like things like BitTorrent. If you are an ISP, what you want is for people to send simple emails from grandmother to grandchild."
The reason why this story has created such an uproar is because it feeds into concerns about network neutrality raised by Internet activists and companies such as Google Inc. (NASDAQ: GOOG) that Internet service providers might start operating their networks like toll roads instead of freeways, favoring some traffic over others.
Plus, BitTorrent is hugely popular. Yoo said statistics show that 50 percent to 70 percent of Internet traffic comes from peer-to-peer file sharing, most of which is done over BitTorrent's network. "The huge volume of file sharing traffic is slowing down the network for everyone else," Yoo said.
For its part, Comcast said it needs to put restrictions on the amount of bandwidth that people can use to prevent the spread of spam e-mails, among other things. These allowances, though, are quite generous, equaling about 30,000 song downloads per month.
Douglas, of Comcast, said "99.9 percent of our customers don't even come close the usage levels."
Comcast's critics question its denials.
"Comcast is using semantics in their denials," said Karl Bode, editor of the Web site Broadband Reports, told PhillyInc in an e-mail. "If you note their responses to most press inquiries, the denials usually say something along the lines of `we do not block access to any applications, including BitTorrent, and do not alter Internet speed.' While that's technically correct, they're not really answering the question."
Broadband Reports and TorrentFreak, another Web site, claim that Comcast is making it impossible for BitTorrent users to share files by manipulating people's PCs, a claim refuted by Comcast.
BitTorrent has generated its share of controversy over the years. Hollywood studios have complained that the service also allows people to swap pirated content and some studios had sued several sites that use it. Then earlier this year, BitTorrent began offering the BitTorrent Entertainment Network in conjunction with major Hollywood studios, which allows people to buy and rent video content and share their original work with other users. Some colleges still restrict access to BitTorrent-enabled sites because of worries about enabling piracy and concerns about it hogging resources.
Stay tuned.
