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Ohio University bans all P2P traffic

27 April 2007 13:30 by Andre "DVDBack23" Yoskowitz | 10 comments

Ohio University has finally decided that something had to be done about their P2P problems. After being tagged as the top piracy school by the RIAA last month, the University has decided to completely ban P2P from their campus network.

Starting tonight, the campus IT will begin to monitor for all P2P activity and if they find any computer engaging in file sharing, the computer will be taken offline until the student contacts the school's service desk.

"Left unchecked, P2P applications can consume all available network bandwidth," said Ohio University CIO Brice Bible. "In fact this happened at Ohio University years ago when the original Napster file-sharing program became widely available."

So far, Ohio University's actions seem to be a solo effort as other schools have yet to try an effort such as banning P2P. Some other schools did not rule out that option for the future however.

Some schools were afraid that by throttling P2P, they would also be stopping legitimate P2P from occuring. As one spokesman said "We're sort of stuck in the middle on this issue," he said. "We're getting pressure from the RIAA and being bombarded with preliminary notices, but there's nothing we can do other than pointing students to our acceptable use policy. If we try to kill off the Azureus traffic, we run the risk of throttling legitimate P2P traffic, too."

It will be interesting to see how Ohio University's effort works out and whether other school will follow its lead.

Source:
Arstechnica

Permalink to this article

P2P responsible for up to 90 percent of Internet traffic? (4 September 2007)

Stanford will charge reconnection fee for P2P users (17 May 2007)

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Discuss this article!
borhan9 (AfterDawn Addict) 27 April 2007 14:00
This is one way of dealing with the issue. [ + quote]
krj15489 (Senior Member) 27 April 2007 14:37
couldn't the students pay to set up their own internet with a different internet provider then continue to download? [ + quote]
ZippyDSM (AfterDawn Addict) 27 April 2007 14:40
and they are blocking it how? wouldn't anyone with half arsed networking skills be able to get pass it? [ + quote]
simpsim1 (Member) 27 April 2007 16:18
You can get around it with VPN services that encrypt the traffic, but I dare say that the provider will probably be on the lookout for the most popular VPN domains (Like SecureIX or FindNot for example). That said, it's a case of "Prove what I'm using a VPN for." [ + quote]
ZippyDSM (AfterDawn Addict) 27 April 2007 18:06
Originally posted by simpsim1: You can get around it with VPN services that encrypt the traffic, but I dare say that the provider will probably be on the lookout for the most popular VPN domains (Like SecureIX or FindNot for example). That said, it's a case of "Prove what I'm using a VPN for." they need to do something for show,at least it will get the media mafia off thier backs for a bit. [ + quote]
klassic (Member) 27 April 2007 19:00
Originally posted by krj15489: couldn't the students pay to set up their own internet with a different internet provider then continue to download? Yes & No. If you live in the dorms or on campus housing then you cannot get a different internet provider. If you live in an apartment or house off campus then you can do what ever you want because you are not on the schools network. If you connect at a campus wifi spot you will also be blocked from p2p. Its their bandwidth. You just rent it, and they can allow or not allow whatever they want on it. [ + quote]
ZippyDSM (AfterDawn Addict) 27 April 2007 19:43
Quote: Originally posted by krj15489: couldn't the students pay to set up their own internet with a different internet provider then continue to download? Yes & No. If you live in the dorms or on campus housing then you cannot get a different internet provider. If you live in an apartment or house off campus then you can do what ever you want because you are not on the schools network. If you connect at a campus wifi spot you will also be blocked from p2p. Its their bandwidth. You just rent it, and they can allow or not allow whatever they want on it. I wonder if it would kill all transfers threw non browsers it kill the IMs and Online gaming too wouldn't it? [ + quote]
Smee342 (Junior Member) 28 April 2007 0:42
Quote: [quote] Originally posted by krj15489: couldn't the students pay to set up their own internet with a different internet provider then continue to download? Yes & No. If you live in the dorms or on campus housing then you cannot get a different internet provider. If you live in an apartment or house off campus then you can do what ever you want because you are not on the schools network. If you connect at a campus wifi spot you will also be blocked from p2p. Its their bandwidth. You just rent it, and they can allow or not allow whatever they want on it. I wonder if it would kill all transfers threw non browsers it kill the IMs and Online gaming too wouldn't it?[/quote]not exactly but like wat one person said, anyone one with some IT skillz should have no problems . but i can kill WoW updates becouse from my understanding bliz uses a P2P like system to send out updates. ahaha slash off ohio from my list of colleges lol Smee [ + quote]
jwwolf (Newbie) 28 April 2007 11:19
Originally posted by simpsim1: You can get around it with VPN services that encrypt the traffic, but I dare say that the provider will probably be on the lookout for the most popular VPN domains (Like SecureIX or FindNot for example). That said, it's a case of "Prove what I'm using a VPN for." doubt they heard of this https://www.relakks.com/?lang=eng&cid=gb [ + quote] This message has been edited since posting. Last time this message was edited on 28 April 2007 11:19
simpsim1 (Member) 28 April 2007 14:56
Pretty much the same thing. If it's VPN traffic it would all go through one port. Because it's encrypted, your campus ISP won't know what you're doing. The SecureIX service I mentioned earlier has a basic half meg service for free, so I guess it might attract a few logins from Ohio soon LOL!! You can probably bet that nearly all VPN services will be targeted by ISPs in some way or another. Usually it's just throttled bandwidth (Defeating the object somewhat). There are a lot of legitimate uses for VPNs, so it's unlikely they'd block them altogether. Their are a couple of lesser known third party VPNs about that use a different means of encryption and therefore avoid the ISPs blocks (These VPNs are usually provided for wireless hotspot users, but sometimes allow anyone to log onto them). [ + quote] This message has been edited since posting. Last time this message was edited on 28 April 2007 15:06