Getting Around ISP Traffic Shaping with a VPN

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by Blacklogic1

With a VPN, it's easy to get around blocks on BitTorrent, Skype and other applications put in place by ISPs like Rogers and Comcast.

Increasingly, Internet service providers are using a technique known as traffic shaping to try and control what their customers do with the connection that they paid their hard-earned money for. With an anonymous VPN service, it's possible to circumvent the blocks on services like Skype and BitTorrent put into place by Comcast, Rogers and others.
How does traffic shaping work?

To the implications of traffic shaping on consumers (and, concurrently, find ways to evade such shaping), it's important to know how traffic shaping works to block or slow down Internet traffic.

Canadian service providers, most notoriously Rogers, have implemented harsh traffic shaping policies in an attempt to stop peer-to-peer file sharing on their networks. Rogers has gone so far as to block encrypted traffic of any sort and, at one point, block the download of files with a .torrent extension. This is typically done through QoS (quality of service) hardware at the ISP's end and, thus, is impossible to circumvent without using a VPN service like Blacklogic. In the case of Rogers, such extreme traffic shaping caused an extensive backlash and tarnished the company's reputation, perhaps permanently, as customers moved in droves to service providers that gave them the bandwidth and access that they pay money for.
Comcast, Sandvine and packet forgery

Not to be outdone, Comcast, the largest broadband provider in the United States, began shaping users' BitTorrent traffic in 2007 using a system called Sandvine. Insidious and dishonest, Sandvine actually injects its own data into a user's BitTorrent session. This operation is worse than traffic shaping, because it is actual forgery of a legitimate user's data. By sending TCP RST (reset) packets to peers in a torrent swarm, a user is effectively prevented from seeding a torrent file without resorting to high-level encryption that is not supported by all torrent clients. This slows down the download for everyone involved.
Getting around traffic shaping with a VPN

While there are ways around most traffic shaping and filtering, they are often unreliable and hinder transfer speeds so much as to be unusable. The easiest way to get around traffic shaping is by using an anonymous VPN. Services like Blacklogic were designed with downloading in mind. Using a Blacklogic VPN, for example, is the same as sitting at a computer in Canada, where Blacklogic' servers are located. Torrent files can seed, Skype can make calls, and blocked websites are suddenly unblocked, not to mention that the access provided is completely anonymous. Whether you're being blocked by Rogers, Comcast or another ISP, a VPN is the only 100% reliable way to get around BitTorrent, Skype and other traffic shaping.
The last word on Sandvine and traffic shaping

As long as you're not doing anything illegal, your service provider has absolutely no right to try and limit what you do with your connection that you paid for. If you can't send them a message by switching to a different ISP, use a VPN and get around their draconian blocks.

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