BitTorrent and Oversi?

[Switeck]

BitTorrent and Oversi Collaborate to Deliver Optimal P2P Solution for ISPs

http://www.oversi.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=88&Itemid=30

So yet more deals to make BitTorrent faster/more suited to ISP's needs...because BitTorrent doesn't know how to do so on its own?

"BitTorrent's intelligent client protocols (Policy Discovery Protocols) communicate with Oversi's NetEnhancer™ network intelligence platform to improve peer selection in line with the ISP's network capabilities while speeding up P2P downloads. With enhanced intelligence, the ISP and P2P clients avoid network bottlenecks. The solution is simple to deploy in the P2P cloud and uses the ISP's existing network resources."

"NetEnhancer, Oversi's recently launched P2P management tool, optimizes service providers' resources by automatically routing P2P traffic to local peers in line with the available network resources of the operator. BitTorrent's Policy Discovery Protocol is designed to help peers automatically discover ISP policies which will optimize peer selection and accelerate downloads."

To me, this sounds like listening in on BitTorrent communication traffic...and silently rerouting it.

In short, Deep Packet Inspection to identify peer list packets and fake packet smithing to modify those peer lists.

This might be vulnerable to hostile or dead ip injection, which won't increase download speed...only noise levels. Greedy ISPs utilizing this might go 1 step further and REMOVE all "distant" ips of other ISPs in the peer lists. A faulty or restrictive design could accidentally or intentionally block access to content. An ISP design that affects PRIVATE torrents could get site members banned for ratio discrepancies (uploading/downloading from "invisible" peers/seeds) or for not uploading to "distant" members.