Data cap

Last updated

A data cap, often erroneously referred to as a bandwidth cap, is an artificial restriction imposed on the transfer of data over a network. In particular, it refers to policies imposed by an internet service provider in order to limit customers' usage of their services; typically, exceeding a data cap would require the subscriber to pay additional fees based on whether they have exceeded this limit. Implementation of a data cap is sometimes termed a fair access policy, fair usage policy, or usage-based billing by ISPs. [1]

Contents

U.S. ISPs have asserted that data caps are required in order to provide a "fair" service to their respective subscribers. The use of data caps has been criticized for becoming increasingly unnecessary, as decreasing infrastructure costs have made it cheaper for ISPs to increase the capacity of their networks to keep up with the demands of their users, rather than place arbitrary limits on usage. It has also been asserted that data caps are meant to help protect pay television providers that may also be owned by an ISP from competition with over-the-top streaming services.

Although often referred to as a "bandwidth cap", it is not the actual bandwidth (bits per second) that is limited, but the total amount of data downloaded per month.

Standard cap

Generally, each user of a network is expected to use high speed transmission for a short time, for example to download a megabyte web page in less than a second. Continuous usage, such as when sharing files or streaming videos can seriously impair service for others.[ citation needed ] In DSL, where the core network is shared but the access network is not, this concept is less relevant. However, it becomes more relevant in cable internet, where both the core network and the access network are shared, and on wireless networks, where the total network bandwidth is also relatively narrow.[ citation needed ]

Example cap

In 2016, U.S. provider Comcast offered a service plan with a data cap of 1 terabyte. [1] At contemporary data consumption rates, each member of a family of four would need to separately watch 100 movies in a month to approach the cap. [1] In that case, typical data usage habits would not exceed that cap. [1]

Unlimited data

"Unlimited data" is sometimes a marketing promotion in which an Internet service provider offers access to Internet without cutting service at the data cap. [2] However, after a user passes some data cap, the provider will begin bandwidth throttling to decrease the user's speed of access to data, slowing down the user's internet use. [2]

Many providers throughout the rest of the world offer no data cap at all, but they may impose a fair use policy, allowing them to disconnect users with excessive download usage.

By region

As of October 2015, there were 58 wired broadband providers in the US that used data caps, among them major wireless cell phone providers such as Verizon Wireless and AT&T. [3]

Before 2010 there was a trend of providing unlimited data without bandwidth throttling. [4] In the United States the Federal Communications Commission has fined service providers for offering unlimited data in a way that misled consumers. In June 2015, the FCC fined AT&T Mobility US$100,000,000 for misleading consumers. [5] In October 2016 the FCC reached a settlement with T-Mobile in which they would pay US$48,000,000 for failing to disclose restrictions on their unlimited data plans. [6]

Iranian Communications Regulatory Authority set a Fair Usage Policy in 2017. [7] [8]

Justification

U.S. internet service providers have most recently asserted that data caps are needed in order to provide "fair", tiered services at different price points based on speed and usage. [9] [10] [11]

In 2016, Sonic.net CEO Dane Jasper criticized the historical assertions that data caps are meant to conserve network capacity, arguing that the cost of actually delivering service had "declined much faster than the increase in data traffic". When Sonic was first established in 2008, its infrastructure costs were equivalent to 20% of its revenue, but these had fallen to only 1.5% by 2016 because of the declining costs of equipment. [9] Suddenlink CEO Jerry Kent made a similar assertion in an investors' call, stating that the "days" of having to make investments to keep up with customer demand were "over", and there would be "significant free cash flow generated from the cable operators as our capital expenditures continue to come down." [10]

As most major U.S. internet providers own television providers, it has also been suggested that data caps are intended to discourage users from dropping their pay television subscriptions by placing de facto restrictions on the use of competing streaming video services that are delivered over the internet, such as Netflix. [9] [12] The lobbying group Internet Association additionally argued that data caps are meant to create "artificial scarcity", especially in markets where there is limited competition in broadband, also pointing out that some providers offer their own streaming video services that are exempted from data cap policies, such as Comcast's Stream TV. Comcast defended the exemption by stating that the service is not delivered over the public internet; it can only be used while connected to the provider's home Wi-Fi router. [13] [14]

See also

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Wireless broadband</span> Telecommunications technology

Wireless broadband is a telecommunications technology that provides high-speed wireless Internet access or computer networking access over a wide area. The term encompasses both fixed and mobile broadband.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Internet access</span> Individual connection to the Internet

Internet access is a facility or service that provides connectivity for a computer, a computer network, or other network device to the Internet, and for individuals or organizations to access or use applications such as email and the World Wide Web. Internet access is offered for sale by an international hierarchy of Internet service providers (ISPs) using various networking technologies. At the retail level, many organizations, including municipal entities, also provide cost-free access to the general public.

Rogers Hi-Speed Internet is a broadband Internet service provider in Canada, owned by Rogers Communications. Rogers previously operated under the brand names Rogers@Home, Rogers Yahoo! Hi-Speed Internet, WAVE, and Road Runner in Newfoundland. It is currently the second largest Internet provider in Canada, after Bell Internet by customer count.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Net neutrality</span> Principle that Internet service providers should treat all data equally

Network neutrality, often referred to as net neutrality, is the principle that Internet service providers (ISPs) must treat all Internet communications equally, offering users and online content providers consistent rates irrespective of content, website, platform, application, type of equipment, source address, destination address, or method of communication. Net neutrality was advocated for in the 1990s by the presidential administration of Bill Clinton in the United States. Clinton's signing of the Telecommunications Act of 1996, an amendment to the Communications Act of 1934, set a worldwide example for net neutrality laws and the regulation of ISPs.

Bandwidth throttling consists in the limitation of the communication speed, of the ingoing (received) or outgoing (sent) data in a network node or in a network device such as computers and mobile phones.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Xfinity</span> American cable provider

Comcast Cable Communications, LLC, doing business as Xfinity, is an American telecommunications business segment and division of Comcast Corporation. It is used to market consumer cable television, internet, telephone, and wireless services provided by the company. The brand was first introduced in 2010; prior to that, these services were marketed primarily under the Comcast name.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Be Un Limited</span> Internet service provider in the UK

Be Unlimited was an Internet service provider in the United Kingdom between 2004 and 2014. Initially founded as an independent company by Boris Ivanovic and Dana Tobak in 2005, it was bought by Spanish group Telefónica Europe in 2006 before being sold on to BSkyB in March 2013 in an agreement which saw BSkyB buy the fixed telephone line and broadband business of Telefónica Europe which at the time traded under the O2 and BE brands. The deal saw BSkyB agree to pay £180 million initially, followed by a further £20 million after all customers had been transferred to Sky's existing business. The sale was subject to regulatory approval in April 2013, and was subsequently approved by the Office of Fair Trading on 16 May 2013.

Spectrum is the trade name of Charter Communications, which is widely used by market consumers and commercial cable television channels, internet, telephone, and wireless service providers.

In telecommunications, cable Internet access, shortened to cable Internet, is a form of broadband internet access which uses the same infrastructure as cable television. Like digital subscriber line and fiber to the premises services, cable Internet access provides network edge connectivity from the Internet service provider to an end user. It is integrated into the cable television infrastructure analogously to DSL which uses the existing telephone network. Cable TV networks and telecommunications networks are the two predominant forms of residential Internet access. Recently, both have seen increased competition from fiber deployments, wireless, mobile networks and satellite internet access.

In the United States, net neutrality—the principle that Internet service providers (ISPs) should make no distinctions between different kinds of content on the Internet, and to not discriminate based on such distinctions—has been an issue of contention between end-users and ISPs since the 1990s. With net neutrality, ISPs may not intentionally block, slow down, or charge different rates for specific online content. Without net neutrality, ISPs may prioritize certain types of traffic, meter others, or potentially block specific types of content, while charging consumers different rates for that content.

Internet access is widely available in New Zealand, with 94% of New Zealanders having access to the internet as of January 2021. It first became accessible to university students in the country in 1989. As of June 2018, there are 1,867,000 broadband connections, of which 1,524,000 are residential and 361,000 are business or government.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Internet in the United States</span> Overview of the Internet in the United States of America

The Internet in the United States grew out of the ARPANET, a network sponsored by the Advanced Research Projects Agency of the U.S. Department of Defense during the 1960s. The Internet in the United States in turn provided the foundation for the worldwide Internet of today.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Internet in Canada</span>

Canada ranks as the 21st in the world for Internet usage with 31.77 million users as of July 2016 (est), making up 89.8% of the population. According to Harvard researchers, Canada has some of the lowest internet standards among OECD countries, as a result of high costs and slow internet speeds.

Hart v. Comcast was a suit filed by Jon Hart, a citizen of California against Comcast in Alameda County. Comcast is a provider of internet access and services. The suit alleged that Comcast was illegally interfering with certain types of internet traffic, such as BitTorrent. The suit alleged that Comcast is guilty of false advertising for advertising high speed services yet deliberately using technology to interfere with access speeds. The suit also claimed Comcast's actions violated established Federal Communications Commission policies on Net Neutrality. The case has since been settled out of court.

Net neutrality in Canada is a debated issue, but not to the degree of partisanship in other nations, such as the United States, in part because of its federal regulatory structure and pre-existing supportive laws that were enacted decades before the debate arose. In Canada, Internet service providers (ISPs) generally provide Internet service in a neutral manner. Some notable incidents otherwise have included Bell Canada's throttling of certain protocols and Telus's censorship of a specific website critical of the company.

Tiered service structures allow users to select from a small set of tiers at progressively increasing price points to receive the product or products best suited to their needs. Such systems are frequently seen in the telecommunications field, specifically when it comes to wireless service, digital and cable television options, and broadband internet access.

Internet bottlenecks are places in telecommunication networks in which internet service providers (ISPs), or naturally occurring high use of the network, slow or alter the network speed of the users and/or content producers using that network. A bottleneck is a more general term for a system that has been reduced or slowed due to limited resources or components. The bottleneck occurs in a network when there are too many users attempting to access a specific resource. Internet bottlenecks provide artificial and natural network choke points to inhibit certain sets of users from overloading the entire network by consuming too much bandwidth. Theoretically, this will lead users and content producers through alternative paths to accomplish their goals while limiting the network load at any one time. Alternatively, internet bottlenecks have been seen as a way for ISPs to take advantage of their dominant market-power increasing rates for content providers to push past bottlenecks. The United States Federal Communications Commission (FCC) has created regulations stipulating that artificial bottlenecks are in direct opposition to a free and open Internet.

Net bias is the counter-principle to net neutrality, which indicates differentiation or discrimination of price and the quality of content or applications on the Internet by ISPs. Similar terms include data discrimination, digital redlining, and network management.

Internet rush hour is the time period when the majority of Internet users are online at the same time. Typically, in the UK the peak hours are between 7 and 11 pm. During this time frame, users commonly experience slowness while browsing or downloading content. The congestion experienced during the rush hour is similar to transportation rush hour, where demand for resources outweighs capacity.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Zero-rating</span> Internet access under certain conditions

Zero-rating is the practice of providing Internet access without financial cost under certain conditions, such as by permitting access to only certain websites or by subsidizing the service with advertising or by exempting certain websites from the data allowance.

References

  1. 1 2 3 4 Willcox, James K. (October 19, 2016). "How Easy Is It to Burn Through a 1TB Data Cap?". Consumer Reports. Retrieved January 23, 2017.
  2. 1 2 Gikas, Mike (June 18, 2015). "AT&T and the truth about 'unlimited' data plans". Consumer Reports. Retrieved January 23, 2017.
  3. ↑ Nick Reese (October 9, 2015). "Internet Providers with Data Caps". Broadbandnow.com. Archived from the original on June 25, 2016. Retrieved April 15, 2016.
  4. ↑ Wolff-Mann, Ethan (June 7, 2016). "'Unlimited' data plans aren't really unlimited". Money.com . Archived from the original on May 31, 2022. Retrieved January 23, 2017.
  5. ↑ Federal Communications Commission (June 17, 2015). "AT&T Mobility Faces $100M Fine For Misleading Consumers". Federal Communications Commission. Retrieved January 23, 2017.
  6. ↑ Federal Communications Commission (October 19, 2016). "FCC Reaches $48m Settlement with T-Mobile Over Unlimited' Data Plans". Federal Communications Commission. Retrieved January 23, 2017.
  7. ↑ "Iran Telecom Regulator to Ease Internet Fair Usage Policy". Eghtesad Online. Retrieved November 24, 2020.
  8. ↑ "Iran Regulator Introduces Internet Fair Usage Policy". Financial Tribune. November 21, 2017. Retrieved November 24, 2020.
  9. 1 2 3 "What big ISPs don't want you to know about data caps". CIO. Retrieved March 20, 2017.
  10. 1 2 Wolff-Mann, Ethan (June 7, 2016). "Broadband CEOs Admit There's No Real Reason For Data Caps Besides Boosting Profit". Money.com. Archived from the original on December 20, 2021. Retrieved March 20, 2017.
  11. ↑ Brodkin, Jon (May 14, 2014). "Comcast plans data caps for all customers in 5 years, could be 500GB". Ars Technica. Retrieved April 15, 2016.
  12. ↑ "Netflix Wants Help from U.S. Against Cable Data Caps". Bloomberg. June 27, 2012. Retrieved April 15, 2016.
  13. ↑ "Comcast rolls out a new Stream TV app for its cable and internet TV customers". TechCrunch. February 15, 2017. Retrieved March 21, 2017.
  14. ↑ "Comcast Wants to Limit Your Netflix Binges". Bloomberg.com. January 28, 2016. Retrieved March 20, 2017.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.