Developed for Sweden's many small, local fiber networks, this innovative bandwidth management solution provides features, such as user-based bandwidth on demand and detailed subscriber behavior data, that may not be available anywhere else in the U.S. market.

by Alex Goldman ISP-Planet Associate Editor [September 15, 2003]

Netintact, of Varberg, Sweden (with U.S. headquarters in Culver City, Calif. and sales offices in South Orange, N.J.), is bringing its broadband traffic management solution to the U.S.

The solution was developed for Sweden's vibrant and competitive fiber broadband market. Many cities have their own local power utilities, and the power utilities have rolled out fiber to the home. The result is many small, local ISPs that require high-bandwidth traffic shaping solutions.

To serve this market, Netintact has a purpose-built appliance with modular proprietary software that measures traffic, shapes it, and stores and presents statistics. Administrators use a special, bundled GUI to monitor and change traffic.

The five software modules currently available for Netintact's PacketLogic solution are:

Surveillance. This module, which is the only module whose purchase is not optional, collects statistics on traffic and usage in real time, compiling data from the largest overview of usage by protocol type to a granular examination of the behavior of individual subscribers.

Firewall. The firewall is a layer 2 through 7 component, making it immune to DoS attacks, which are one common method for attacking firewalls. The firewall uses the device's integrated database to enable rules based on a wide variety of criteria including: application signature, server, server port, client port, time of day, and port.

Traffic Shaping. The layer 7 traffic shaper uses the same detailed and flexible database as the firewall to prioritize traffic. While the firewall accepts or denies traffic, the shaper prioritizes applications and users according to pre-set criteria. All rules can be viewed in one window, and rules can be changed in real time.

Statistics. This module allows administrators to sort and view data collected by the Surveillance module. Administrators can view application use across all subscribers, traffic usage, or drill down to learn more about the behavior of individual subscribers.

NetAccess. This unusual module allows end-users to buy bandwidth on demand for even very short periods of time. Developed for Sweden's fiber networks, it may be too advanced for implementation in most North American networks. On the other hand, for leading edge U.S. networks, there may well be no similar product on the market.

Designed for fiber networks (the fastest broadband around), but now deployed around the world on broadband networks of all kinds, the device, says Bjorn Kalderen, Netintact's US director of business development, has "almost no latency," which he quantifies as 0.13 ms. Furthermore, it can be installed in-path or out-of-path. Kalderen says that ISPs that buy, for example, only the statistics module may not need the speed of an in-path solution, whereas those using all five modules will want to put PacketLogic in the data path.

For larger networks, Kalderen notes that the GUI can manage multiple PacketLogic devices. Additional devices are required when the network has many entrance and egress points, and ISPs will put one or two devices at each point.

The device is particularly useful for controlling peer-to-peer (P2P) traffic. Notes Kalderen, "traffic patterns are changing, and peer-to-peer traffic programs no longer use a specific port or protocol. It's no longer just port 80 or just FTP."

Along with the rise in P2P is a fundamental change in the shape of traffic. Whereas, in the past, traffic was mostly incoming, P2P file sharers dramatically increase the amount of outgoing traffic. Networks designed for downloading but not uploading may be taxed, and if ISPs do not have detailed network statistics, they may not be able to solve the problems this new traffic causes.

Kalderen further notes that current threats occur quickly, and that PacketLogic can be set to update traffic statistics every second, which could be useful in an emergency.

Solving the traffic problem
One such emergency occurred in August at Wireless ISP (WISP) My Way Wireless of Hoboken, N.J. Says Chris Burke, the ISP's network administrator, "I was seeing ARP storms. The virus was sending ARP requests throughout the network. We had four or five infected users. I used PacketLogic to track them down and shut them off. Then I called them and told them they had a virus. I let them back on the network to download anti-virus software updates while I was on the phone."

Problem identified, and then solved: that's the goal of a good traffic management solution. Netintact's rivals include Allot, Packeteer, and Linux-based freeware, and are more established in the U.S. market, but high bandwidth ISPs should certainly check out Netintact's solution, which they may not have heard of, when looking at solutions from other vendors.

Pricing and availability
Netintact's PacketLogic solution and the five modules described in this article are available now. Pricing is based on number of IP addresses served. For an ISP with 128 IP addresses, the product is about $6,400 for the appliance and the Surveillance module, with additional modules costing between $2,000 and $3,100 each.

Additional modules are being developed.

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